Revisions. Redesigns. Conferences. Committee meetings. And finally. One little checkmark by the CEO, and it is a done deal.

My work website is undergoing drastic reconstructive surgery, with yours truly as the head surgeon.

As such, I have actually had to do stuff. Cutting up and coding and nudging, and generally proving my worth as the hottest HTML jockey this side of the...hell, on BOTH sides of the damned Mississippi.

I have felt tremendously productive for a change -- I have even come into work early and left late every day this week. I have scarcely had time to check my email. I am always so much happier when I have a tremendous, insurmountable pile of work sitting next to me than when I have one or two easily-managed projects. Someday I will figure out why I have this need to make things as hard on myself as they possibly could ever be.

A few comments that I have enjoyed lately, by the way:

Yesterday, a lady getting on the elevator paused to tell me that she LOVES my haircut. "I mean, I really love that! It's fabulous!" she says.

Last night, StyleGirl and I were discussing parental roles, and how there is a "mean" strict parent and a "nice" permissive parent. She forsees herself in the role of strict, and declared that I would clearly become the beloved, favorite parent. "What makes you say that?" I ask. "Oh, come on," she replies. "You're already the favorite. Everywhere you go. Everyone is all, 'Hooray, he's here!!!'" That is approximately the point at which I started glowing with happyjuice. For some reason, I still get surprised when people who have been my friends for ten years say they want to hang out with me. Some obscure bit of my brain is convinced that they are only hanging out with me out of some sense of obligation, and to have external confirmation of the fact that "You like me! You really like me!" is both touching and wonderfully good for my Leonine ego.