Match Madness Redux

I'm still #1 in my pool but stupid Kentucky means I can't win. I had big plans for the winnings- over $600 toward 2012 final four tickets. Sigh!

Whole Wheat & Cinnamon Craisin Bagels

Whole Wheat Garlic Knots

Saguaro

Madness!

I kind of tend to get March Madness. Weird, right? A couple of related things:

1. We sing this all the time at home these days:



2. We're going to watch Wisconsin play in Tucson tomorrow.

3. As of right this very minute I'm #1 in my bracket pool thing, out of like 40 people.

Go Badgers!

In Praise of the YMCA

Over the years, my years of being on my own and belonging to gyms, I've done both private gyms and YMCAs. When we moved to Flagstaff, there was no Y here (I know, right? Don't get me started on living in a land of no GAP, either, it makes me disoriented.) But last summer they finished the one they were building and in October I joined (there was a discount through work, duh.)
So no matter what kind of gym I belong to, I hate-hate-hate that initial point where you don't really know your way around or how things work. I've known people who used free 1-week passes to go from gym to gym and get free workouts... but this is like my nightmare. Always not knowing where things are or how to sign up for classes? ASKING all the time? Ugh. Terrible.
So anyway, the Y here is super nice (although too small already, something about Flagstaff's big box store ordinance, I've been told in the lockerroom and don't understand) and has won all these green building awards and blah blah. But. I love it there.

It has a preschool in it, along with a daycare for kids with parents using the Y. I loved right before Halloween when the kids paraded through the cardio room with homemade masks on. I love the volleyball preteens who come to Zumba after practice, stand in the back and mimic us (ok, well not really them, they're actually pretty annoying, but I like that they're there for volleyball...) I love the yoga instructor who used to be a gymnast and so is fit but doesn't look all regular yoga-y instructor-y lithe... but like a regular person. I love all the different kinds of people who are there.

I do wish it was bigger, there was more parking and they provided towels. So, not all wine and roses with the YMCA, see?

Roasted Garlic & Tomato Olive Oil Wheat Baguette

Thanks

I had this client a couple of weeks ago and I had tried so hard to help her and to make things better. She had a mental health diagnosis that came about two years too late to keep her from getting into trouble. I really wanted to help her; maybe because she reminded me of my sister, maybe because mental health problems seem very ‘but for the grace of god’ to me, maybe because she has twin infants at home, maybe because she and her mom were trying so hard to make the best of her situation. Anyway, I tried really hard and we got a result that wasn’t perfect and will require her to do some substantial jail time… but was a lot better than what she was facing. And we made quite an impression on each other, she hugged me after she was sentenced and said thank you. And I knew she was going into jail the other day and so I checked for her on the jail list, just to make sure everything was going as planned. And then I got this card in the mail today.
I’ve been told and warned a lot that people will never appreciate me in my job. And to a large extent it’s true, it’s somewhat… thankless. I can’t make the impossible happen and so I get blamed from most sides, despite usually being the only one in the situation who had nothing to do with causing it at all. But it’s not completely thankless and really I’ve been thanked quite a bit. And it's nice every so often to be told people can tell you really care... when you're using a lot of energy really caring.

Someone from law school recently had a facebook status about hating being a lawyer… but I have to think, and feel a little bad for her that it's probably because she’ll never get a card like this.