It's the Return of the...

It feels like forever since I've written for my beloved Y2K. As loyal readers are aware, Monday I started my new job. Good news is it's going great so far. Great group of people, really interesting work. For the first time in my professional life, I'm really enjoying what I'm doing, through one week at least.

But there's a slight downside. In my old job I was working, on average, 45 hours a week. In around 9, out around 6. Man, those were the days. New job has me in at 8, which is fine, but doesn't factor in the 2 hours beforehand spent reading the FT and Journal. Then I leave work at around 10 or 11. All told, I tallied 72.5 hours in the office this past week.

It sounds worse than it is. Honestly, I'm a lot happier now. But there is one major downside which is that I can't write for the old website as often as I could before. That's a bummer but what can you do?

So Mondays are my new gig, and honestly it's just as well that my first post didn't come earlier in the week. See, the first couple days in this job I was pretty pissed off.

I get discouraged easily if I'm not instantly good at something. Really bad trait. I attribute it to my boyhood days as a legend of the various West Side Little Leagues.

I was one of those kids who was really good at the sports that matter when you're young, baseball and soccer. They came very easily to me. To this day I feel like everything should come as easily as those did, and when they don't I get upset at myself.

Anyway, first couple days on the job I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I was working intense hours at something that I didn't feel particularly good at, and I was upset with myself.

Then I would come home around 11, and the Mets would be in the 4th inning or so. Dazed from a 15 hour day, I would watch the television and, for the first time in my life, really resent the people on the screen.

"These fucking guys," I'd mutter to myself, "how the fuck are they earning 10 million a year to work 3 hours a day when I'm earning X for 15 hours a day?"

It's the first time I'd ever had a thought like that. It bothered me that I was even thinking it, but I couldn't help it. It just didn't seem fair.

But I've had some time to get better at my job by this point -- I'm no old pro but I'm starting to get the hang of it a little bit, and so it was that this weekend I rediscovered the joy of baseball.

Out at a shitty bar Friday night, I watched the Mets close out their win as a table of pickled older men nearby looked on and cheered. Tonight I watched the end of the Mets game with my boys and loved it; loving Shawn Green in the 9th, hating Shawn Green in the 10th, cursing Wagner leading off the 10th, singing his praises after he closed out the 10th.

Then I turned on Entourage, the biggest Mets-bashing show in the game, and there was Johnny Drama wearing a vintage '86 Lenny Dykstra jersey, and I thought, cot damn, everything's coming up A.F.O.M.G. tonight.

So I'm back, baby. Back at Y2K, back to the boys, back to old school Glass Man.

Could've been that bottle of wine over dinner but I'm feeling good. I'll work my ass off over the next year but fuck it, what have I got to do that's so important on a Tuesday night?

Before I go, couple music tips for those of you out there who are in to that kind of thing. One, the new Arctic Monkeys, Favourite Worst Nightmare. I'm not someone who loved their first CD, but this one is the truth. "Fluorescent Adolescent" is my early favorite, but it's just a really solid disc start to finish.

Two, this group called Saturday Looks Good to Me has an album called All Your Summer Songs, which is perfectly breezy for these long summer days. Uncork a bottle of your favorite white and put on "Ultimate Stars" or "Alcohol" or "Underwater" or "Since You Stole My Heart" (different album) and try not to just love life.

One review I was reading likened their music to The Beach Boys; that's lofty territory of course, but I can kind of see where they're coming from with that. It's not a CD you'll listen to start to finish and love the first time around, but it's a grower. Give it a shot.

And that's it.

- A.F.O.M.G.

(Images courtesy of careerbuilder.typepad.com, astrosdaily.com and panther1.last.fm)