Things have been relatively quiet on theMaykazine (I even ignored alerts about my domain mapping running out until the very last day I had to renew.) because a torrent of change came swooping down on me. I’ve been hired and, a few weeks later, promoted for separate positions. Billiam and I received a thumbs-up on our dream rental house and I received a new job offer, all in the same 24-hour span. I’ve been very anxious, really overwhelmed, and nearly completely distracted. What follows is what I believe explains the horrific acne that’s been attacking my face since recovering from my Cabo sunburn. Altogether, it also informs my own curiosity about when my next bout of depression would be. (Answer: Not any time soon! I’m guessing I won’t even have time to feel for the next couple of weeks.)

So today was my last day at the Apple store, rounding off three iPhone launches that I’ve been around for. (Yes, I’m actually thinking of throwing down some money for the 3G S. Eventually.) Things are on the upswing! And now, it’s time to get my (new[er]) life back on track.

April

07–Going through Craigslist, I see the San Francisco Bay Guardian (SFBG) is searching for its next round of summer interns. I applied for an opening three years ago but didn’t hear from them. I try once again for Style Editorial Intern.

08–I find an opening for Editorial Assistant (EA) at Aplia, a company that makes Web modules to supplement college textbooks. A friend of mine works at the parent company. I contact him and he agrees to be my referral. (I used to be very interested in higher education administration. After an internship at Seattle University, I decided that though I want to contribute to education, I didn’t want to be the “young one” who gets mixed up with students.)

May

08–During my lunch break I interview over-the-phone for the EA position with the Talent Acquisition representative.

12–I interview with the SFBG Culture Editor. She offers and I accept the internship right on the spot. Three years in the making!

13–I interview for Family Room Specialist at the Apple store, a position that isn’t yet thoroughly defined. When the question about my availability comes up, I just say I need two days off during the week for my brand new internship.

June

01–While I’m working on a story at SFBG, I get a phone call from a recruiter at Ask.com. They’re looking for a Client Services Editor, a more sophisticated and focused version of my previous Web marketing job.

02–While I’m on the floor at work, I’m pulled away by a manager and (future) supervisor and offered the position of Family Room Specialist. Full time with benefits, finally! I can get sick again!

03–Hiding in my car parked outside of SFBG, I interview over-the-phone with the Managing Editor for the EA job.

After work, Billiam and I go to our first housing visit. It’s not what we want, but it’s good that we got the ball rolling.

04–I interview with three people at Ask. The fourth person I was supposed to meet, the department manager, had scheduling issues. I am told we’ll coordinate a separate time to follow up.

09–I interview for EA with eight different people in-person, on-site, one at a time. The entire process takes about four and a half hours, including an hour-long lunch that ran twice as long as it should have. I win brownie points for knowing Ed Helms as Andrew Bernard and having recently seen a bad zombie movie (Reel Zombies, in case you’re wondering.). I am told to expect to hear from the company in two weeks.

On the ride home, a message in my voicemail informs me that Ask.com is putting the CSE position on hold until Q3. I’ve been strung along before. Instead of feeling disappointed, I welcome the decrease in options.

10–B&I visit three places, two of which we really like.

11–B&I visit a condo that’s really spacious and nice.

13–I start my training as a Family Room Specialist! I take apart two iPhone 3Gs and it totally makes my day.

B&I visit an awesome townhouse with two really fat cats lazing about. It’s homey and lovely.

14–Before heading to the San Raphael Italian Street Art Festival with Mama Tai-Chi, B&I visit one more house in North Berkeley. We are both in love. It is our “reach” house.

15–In the best interests of my own sanity, I tell my editor I’m working from home.

I submit three applications for housing (one via post, one via realty agency, one delivered by hand), including the townhouse and our reach house.

In a follow-up call with the Talent Acquisition rep, I am told that they are ready to make an offer. I do a piss-poor job of trying to negotiate my way to the highest salary possible. I am told I should hear from them by the end of the week.

The owner of our dream house calls us to let us know she’s ready to rent to us. It’s like getting admitted into Harvard and Stanford at the same time. And Oxford and Cambridge, too.

16–During my FRS shift, I miss a phone call from the Talent rep. I call her back during my fifteen-minute break. I receive my EA offer at the salary I was shooting for. Literally, as I am being asked by the rep “Would you like to accept at this time?” one of my coworkers walks by me and starts making faces. I hastily run away. He probably wonders what was going on.

After barely two days of training for FRS, I pull my manager aside and tell him I’ve got a new job.

18–B&I sign our new lease!

I turn in my two weeks’ notice to Apple. (Again.) Fifty-one weeks come to a close.

Which brings us to now. I’m packing and moving, continuing contributions to SFBG, and getting ready for working a 9-to-5(ish) schedule and getting my weekends back.

When it rains, it pours.

I am bruised and drained, but it’s all for a good cause.

Saturday

We christened the place by eating cupcakes in our backyard. (!!!)

Sunday

I wonder if Billiam and I could support the entire house with just his books and my shoes.

I think Pier 1 has really mastered targeting us two as a market. They have a “Mei Book Cabinet.” I’ll take five!

I felt very self conscious this weekend, not because of the sweat glistening on my hairline as I hauled ass boxes, but because I was driving an SUV in crunchy hippie Berkeley. I vowed three years ago never to drive a Mercedes Benz again, but I have to admit borrowing the landboat helped out with all our thangs n’ stuff and stuff n’ thangs. I’d say we’re 30-40% done. All that’s left are the big items, some stuff that stuffs the big items, and actually putting everything away. We’ll worry about look and feel when we can. (I’m a big proponent on living in a space and filling it as it feels it ought to be filled.)

Next weekend is July 4th, Big Item Move-In, and our second anniversary. DAMN I FEEL OLD.

::shuffling off to bed now::

Impetus.
On June 8th, two young girls aged 3 and 6 were shot while sleeping in bed. And that’s when Billiam put his foot down and “We should move” turned into “We are moving NOW.”

I’m not complaining. The assault occurred less than a mile away from my apartment. Ever since Maker Faire, it has been absolutely ordinary to hear gunshots at night. In fact, when I was composing an e-mail to my landlord notifying him of my 30 days’ notice, I counted sixteen gunshots. It was broad daylight and I sent off the message. I walked outside to get my mail, and my landlord was there, weeding. We talked for a bit, and he was astonished at the close proximity of the sounds, too.

Research.
B&I immediately got to pounding the pavement in finding a new home. Virtually, anyway. Our tools?

1. Padmapper. It’s Craigslist, geomapped. I prefer its interface much more over Google Housing’s and Housing Maps’.
2. Gentrifire: San Francisco. Even though we didn’t end up renting in SF, I still love the fire-breathing dragon logo. And you know how San Franciscans are about being within walking distance of cheese shops.
3. RentWiki. It’s a little sparse right now because the bloggers they invited to add content to the site while it was in beta didn’t follow through. I know this because I’m one of them. Oops. Great concept, though! Smart realtors should flood this site with positives about the properties in their jurisdiction.

Downsizing.
Now that we’ve found a(n amazing) place, B&I are met with the challenge of moving two sets of belongings into one space. The entire time we were looking for an apartment, I had a looming fear in the back of my head that my clothes wouldn’t fit in the closets. Especially if there was to be a second person’s wardrobe of clothes in the picture. In the middle of our search, Billiam revealed that he, too, had this concern.

I love you, Current Closet! It's not you, it's your location.

But, lo and behold, we found not an apartment but a house with not a single closet but four. And Billiam has bestowed the walk-in closet (Yes, I said “walk-in closet.”) to me. (We are dating for a reason.)

My goal is to downsize on all the excess that I have as much as I can before we pick up the keys to that U-Haul. I spent my lunch break at Urbanity where I dropped off a bag of clothes for consignment. I picked up the balance my last round of items drew in. After work I drove to the local Goodwill.

Paperbagger.
I’d never actually been inside the local Goodwill. When I got my bags out of my car, a lady from across the parking lot yelled something at me. I didn’t think she was talking to me, it’s not like I dropped something, so I kept walking. She yelled something at me again, and I yelled back, “What?”

She came over and asked me for one of my bags. Her exact words were, “You got some nice bags.” I had two bags of donation items: one Trader Joe’s grocery bag and one BCBG shopping bag. I thought her request was strange, but hey, whatever, I don’t need a paper shopping bag, so I said, “All right, if you can give me a minute, I just need to put these all in one bag.” She said absolutely nothing and just stood over me as I stooped to grab gobs of clothes and gob them into the other gob. It was awkward.

When she finally spoke, it was nothing along the lines of “Thanks for moving your stuff into one bag for me. I’m sorry to inconvenience you in your errand while we stand in the middle of the parking lot.” She just said, “Mm, I could take all of your stuff.” I didn’t pause, though flashes of being smited in the parking lot for clothes I intended to give away ran through my head. “Oh, but you’re smaller than me, though.” I don’t know if this comparison was true or not. I was distracted by how weird the situation was. “That’s a nice bag,” she continued, practically drooling over the paper BCBG shopper with fabric straps.

As I hastily rearranged my straps so that I could still carry my things, I helped her with the second strap to the BCBG bag. (Remember: bag, not purse.) “Got it?” I said. She just walked off and said “Okay. Thanks.”

As I drove off, I considered how I maybe could have turned that into a parking lot sale. The cash couldn’t hurt, right? Unfortunately it might’ve been the city tenderfoot/suburbanite in me, but I was just too creeped out to think.

Lest you think I have no reason to be cautious, might I remind you that I was at my local Goodwill, and the only other notable things in my surrounding area are a dirty BART station and perennial drug turf wars. Given those conditions, the request “Can I have your bags?” doesn’t seem very innocuous.

Unless we work together, you probably haven’t seen me in about a month.

Just so you know, I don’t look like this anymore:

I kind of miss the way my hair used to spill over the hoods of my jackets, but my current state is much, much healthier. I got a trim by an apprentice as part of research for an article I’m doing. I did some more investigation today, and ended up booking an appointment with a “creative” apprentice for next week. It’s listed as “highlight and tint,” but I told the general manager, “I like funky. Whatever you want to throw on my hair, I’ll go with.”

I’ll post progressive shots after the new ‘do.

According to WordPress, this is my 1983rd post. I was born in the year 1983. (The very end of it.)

Today on BART I was totally engrossed in a game of Tetris. Some woman sat next to me.

She started toeing my foot, and since I was wearing Birkenstocks, it was weird to feel someone poking at my bare toes with their cold tongue.

…Wait. It wasn’t the woman, it was her 10-month old French bulldog with brendel stripes. We made friends, “The Little Vacuum” (her words) and I.

Back to our regular daily posts in a couple of weeks!

Congratulations!  Enjoy, dance, swirl around in your moment of wonderful, positive feelings.

Karma happens when you’re ready.

Let me hear more about EVERYTHING later.

I am truly joyful for you and Bill.

)  Mom

Note: I AM NOT ENGAGED. We are going to live in a big, fat house, though, and for a remarkably reasonable fee. We liked it. So we put a ring on it. More info to come.

Things are finally looking up again and I almost can’t believe it. I CAN NO LONGER RESIST THE URGE TO TYPE IN ALL CAPS.

Here are my grey nails, Maya!

Metro Chic grey nails, Sephora by OPI

Awkward mutt, Yogi

WYSIWYG insta-comic, Comic Life by Plasq

Unconditional dog love quote, Disney Pixar’s Up

I’ll get straight to the point: I wear my Puma with pride. People often comment on the shoes that I wear, and it’s because my collection consists of a healthy dose of form strips and speedcats. Basically, I love Puma. (See here. Here. And here. [Oh, and here.]) I forgive them for the misstep that was most of the Holiday 2007 release, because they used Michelle Yeoh in their marketing. And because I fucking love them and they are amazing. They are my lover. Billiam knows this. He is fine with it because I say so.

I’m going to allow you into my brain now and show you what it really means to be a loyalist.

This particular story begins with my pilgrimage to the Puma Black Store in New York last year.

November 2008
I made special plans for myself and the subway (which I am pretty bad at navigating) and headed solo into the meatpacking district. Some people go there for DVF or AMQ.* I went there for PUMA.

At the store, I tried on a pair of Yasuhiro Mihara Speedcat Re-Luxe boots–all while wearing Puma from head-to-toe, I’ll have you know–and fell in love with their silhouette. I’m no stickly girl, and that these seemed flattering to my own set of curves really won me over. But not the price. Though the associates offered to mail them to me, I carefully walked away, dejected Charlie Brown style.

Periodically since November 2008
Once I got home from New York, I checked Puma’s website to learn more about the boots. They were still $400. I saw them being offered on non-Puma websites. They were still $400.

I looked–but didn’t touch–them at Bay Area Puma stores. They were still $400.

When the holiday season passed I hopped online again. Instead of discounting the $400 price, the boots disappeared! This thwarted my plans to save all my Puma gift cards for the Speedcat Re-Luxes. They were still being offered by other Puma distributors, but Puma gift cards wouldn’t help me there. And the price was not far enough from $400.

Late April 2009
After my funds started rebuilding post-Platinum Party/Cabo with the boyfriend’s former roommates but not the boyfriend, I found my mind immediately wandering back to that damn catboot. It was time to deploy all methods of intelligence I had in order to get what I want. (Real Housewives of New York sense of entitlement, anyone?)

Because I hate the novel-esque reenactments of the likes of Yelpers who think they can write, I will spare you the details. The cold, hard stats tell enough of the story without me having to fill in the blanks:

I called every Puma flagship store within driving distance.

I called every Puma outlet within driving distance.

I called the Puma Black store in New York.

I called every Puma flagship store in Southern California.

I called every Puma outlet in Southern California.

I was lost. I had no legitimate way to buy these boots. I finally had to resort to a service I have never had to resort to before: Zappos.com.

May 2009
At this point, Zappos had the boots marked down from $400 to $350. I kept telling myself to wait. They went to $300. I told myself not to buy anything luxurious until my new frosting credit card came in. The price changed to $225. The CC arrived. The price dropped to $200.

I know $200 seems like a lot for anything these days, but if there’s one type of clothing that you really shouldn’t skimp on, it’s shoes. You’re on your feet all day. They better be well constructed, well balanced, and really well designed. Boots, because of the demands of their construction and durability, tend to start at $60 for a decent, unlined pair, but usually promise better quality once you look upwards of $100. Don’t skimp on boots. I have friends who’ve bought boots at Claire’s, and we are not friends anymore. (Kidding.) But really, don’t skimp on boots.

Into the Now
One missed UPS delivery later, and today finally arrived. Held next door by my crybaby hippie neighbors, my new black limited edition designer Yasuhiro Mihara collaboration Puma Speedcat Re-Luxe Boots.

I’m wearing them now. They feel fine. And over half a year of waiting paid off.

Update: Although, CRAP, I just found them for $75 cheaper on a different site! SHITSHITSHIT. Anybody ever bought from DJPremium? Dooooode, dilemma…

*Diane von Furstenberg and Alexander McQueen