2007 began very loudly, very quickly as I danced the night away on a dance floor at a club in Hollywood. It was unlike all others as I didn’t have a ready available clock to watch the seconds slowly tick away. With my earplugs in (I’ve long ago decided that loud noises are bad for my ears; they’re more sensitive than they used to be), the partial inaudible noises of the music mixed with the loud blare of the microphone was how I heard the countdown. Then, before I could gather myself, the new year was upon me.

The next few days were work as usual. However, it seems my ringing was far more than just in my ears. It turns out I rang in the new year not only unusually at a crowded club, but somehow I undesirably acquired the flu. If there’s ever an excuse to extend all the vacation time I had from the holidays, it was a sickness which didn’t seem to want to go away.

I spent the rest of my first weekend of 2007 in bed feeling the angst of sickness and the heat from all those nasty germs floating throughout my body. In a way, it was my last hurrah from a busy December of 2006, allowing me to recover and gather myself to prepare for all the big things to come.

At work, I continue to troll away at a redesign project that began in April of 2006. One that has carried on and on mostly because of indecisiveness and lack of authority. Unfortunately, these elements were beyond most of my control and I did what I thought I should to progress this tardy project. Finally, the project manager stepped up and took charge, allowing me to be what I was hired to be: the designer. It was a nice change of pace for me as I was increasingly burnt out from a lagging, stressful last half of the last year.

January has seen new beginnings in my life. I’ve made numerous new friends, went through many exciting experiences and already made some lasting memories. Note to self: keep in mind when a playoff football game is on the small screen on a Tuesday night. It is not live, nor is it wise to question the bartender’s choice of a basketball game to fill the big screen.

“Some sports fan,” he boasted as he and his barfly cronies laughed. It only took me a few moments to realize my silly mistake.

One Superbowl later, it’s now February and I watch the clock’s seconds tick away.

Big things are on the horizon and it’s only the beginning.