The Portfolios

Our First Thanksgiving in America

We had a great time at Drew, Jorose and Quinn’s house! Click on the image above to see all our pictures full-size. And coming soon… a video of Shea eating ice, which is her new favorite hobby.

So This Is It

The first week of work proved to be pretty much what I thought – making the rounds meeting people and doing a bit of administrative stuff, plus preliminary research on the task at hand. But as I sat in my new cubicle and studied its grey emptiness, I couldn’t help thinking, “So this is it?”

Good friend Jeremy has been lamenting to me these past six months or so how terrible is his own office culture, where they push him relentlessly to meet impossible deadlines with nary a word of encouragement when he fulfills them. And how he laughed when I suggested we get lunch one day and told me that all he has time for is scurrying down to the office cafeteria to bring a sandwich back to his desk, devouring it within the walls of his confines like a lab rat. At the height of my unemployment I actually asked if his firm had any openings; he kindly passed my resume to his superiors but advised me repeatedly that he would never recommend his job to anyone and that, in fact, he was seeking alternative employment.

It was with these facts in mind that I sat down for the first time in my new surroundings. The idea of a cubicle I find abhorrent, but in reality it is not so bad. It’s basically your own office – but whose walls don’t reach the ceilings. That’s about as positive an assessment as I can make.

Tomorrow marks the end of my five month, 18-day unemployed streak.

I will begin work at my first job in New York City – right in the heart of Manhattan – and I’m very excited.

What I’m Working For

This is a shot of me at the MOMA in front of a 1963 Jaguar E-Type Roadster – and this image perfectly shows how I’m feeling about going into my first day of work tomorrow. Finally, Xianyi and I are getting a foothold on our new life in America. Tomorrow is the day we start laying the foundation for our future.

I tried to savor this last week of freedom (I received confirmation that I’d gotten the job about a week ago), but mostly I ended up idling about, not accomplishing anything. I know full well that soon, when I’m in the throes of the daily grind, I’ll wish I had the kind of time I had in the last week – hell, in the last five months – to do whatever pleases me at the given moment. But I just couldn’t think of anything to do, so I sat around watching TV, which was perfect.

What a great week to start a job! Thursday is Thanksgiving, so I imagine the office will be excited about a short week. There will probably be a bunch of administrative things to get to before I even start doing any real work, and with the Christmas season fast approaching, it should be a fairly generous introductory period for me to get settled. By the time the new year rolls around, I’ll know my way around and will be totally in synch with everybody as they buckle down…

Or I could not know what I’m talking about at all, and be in for a hell of a grind right off the bat.