n Friday night, I watched a Dateline special on Tim Russert. It was about as poignant as Dateline gets, frankly, and knowing that Tim Russert -- an unpretentious man with such zeal for his work, with such a beautiful and endless curiosity (a man much younger than my father, by the way) -- had slumped dead at his desk earlier that day filled me with a bit of dread, with a minor-note feeling that has been hard to shake all weekend. Watching footage of Russert, I was moved by how he championed his hometown of Buffalo -- an unloved city, if ever there was one -- but mostly how he admired his father, a whom he always referred to as "Big Russ." Big Russ never bullshit. Big Russ worked two jobs. If Big Russ thought you were a phony, you were done.

Russert wrote a book about his dad, a career sanitation worker and truck driver; in fact, he wrote two books about fatherhood, and it's more than a little heartbreaking that the sudden, shocking end to his life came on the one calendar weekend set aside to celebrate the very subject about which he was so passionate. It's hard to be sincere and earnest about parenthood without making readers want to cling to the rim of the toilet bowl; it's kind of like writing about your cat. But when you think about all the book deals and the careers built on trashing our fathers, Russert's sweet little ode almost seems punk-rock.

Anyway, I was struck by something Russert said about his father: He never complained.

It's a subject I've been thinking about lately, because it's something I find myself doing too often. (Did I just complain about complaining? Well, so be it.) I complain about the construction noise outside my window every morning. I complain about the heat. I complain that there is no decent coffee in this neighborhood, and if there is, a latte costs $4. (Four dollars!) I complain that the subway is too crowded, takes too long, and all of this complaining takes place before I get to work. And what I rarely do, what I wish I did more of, was appreciate how profound it is that I am living in New York, working at a job I genuinely enjoy, and that I can call my father at any time -- he is now retired -- and I can complain to him, and he will listen.

My father is not a complainer. He is a quiet man, sometimes subdued in his temperament -- the stoic Finnish yin to my mother's fiery Irish yang -- but he is not a complainer. I know this, because I cannot tell you the opportunities I have given him for complaining --the times I have had to borrow money, the do-it-yourself projects I carelessly bellyflopped into, quickly becoming a dad-does-it-himself project, the hours he has waited for me to show up from some other place -- a little girl at soccer practice, a teenager with her friends at the mall, a college kid lugging her laundry home for Thanksgiving, a young woman flying back from New York. My dad is the one there, waiting for me when I arrive. I may complain about a lot of things, but even a whiner like me knows when to shup up and count your blessings.

've been writing lately. Not on this site, apparently, but on Salon. This Monday, my interview with "Top Chef" host Tom Colicchio ran on Salon. Yesterday, I got a very nice voicemail from a former colleague: "I think you might be the first journalist to ask him about being a part of the 'bear' community," he said. Well, I don't know about that, but I certainly did ask him. Grrrr.

I also wrote about loving the Tony Awards. Now, the Tonys are a deeply unloved celebration, which I discuss in my article, but they're something my mom and I try to watch every year. I know it makes me a dork. That's OK. I've never aspired to be anything else.

Other than that, what else is happening? It's summer. It was a crisp 87 degrees here in the big city today. Every morning, construction starts on this highrise across the street at 7am. It's like having an alarm clock you can't place on snooze. I might go to the beach tomorrow. I can't find a good book to read. If you know of one, please tell me. And have a good weekend. We all deserve it.

hen my best friend Julie called, I was in the middle of repainting the walls of my apartment the week before I moved out -- slathering two, three coats of white primer over the mint green and the diva red I had so boldly chosen to define each room. I love painting an apartment, watching it take shape and begin to burn with character -- but this was the opposite, erasing whatever impression I had made on this place, leaching it of my personality. I felt depressed that day. Not in a grand way, but in a small, defeated way. I was feeling sorry for myself. Sometimes, when I'm not careful, I do that.

That's when Julie called.

"How's it going?" I sighed, held the phone with a grimy fist, crusty with latex. I looked forward to unloading my frustrations. Julie's been shouldering those for 15 years.

Instead, our conversation took a turn. It was a bracing turn, one that made me wake up from my self-pitying slumber. Because what I didn't know -- what I had no idea about -- was that Julie, a rural legal aid lawyer in Texas, had been given a new case. It was a difficult case, a prominent case, a case I had heard about on "Larry King Live" and which I was, frankly, stunned to discover she was handling. Julie, my best friend, was representing seven of the FLDS polygamist wives.

I really can't tell you about this. I wouldn't even begin to know what to tell you -- what I could tell you, what I should tell you, what I even understand myself. What I can tell you, proudly, is that my best friend Julie won her case yesterday, in which a (conservative!) court in the third district court of appeals ruled that Child Protective Services overstepped their boundaries in taking away these women's children. Yesterday, Julie gave a press conference, which I watched on Larry King Live (while I was talking to her, by the way, which was kind of surreal). She has been on NPR, and Dateline, and who knows what else? The decision has since been appealed; it will not end anytime soon.

But if you suspect that this whole post is just some excuse to congratulate her, just a way to bring more attention to her accomplishment, just a way to transmit to our friends who might not have caught her on the transom the amazing things that she is doing -- well, I would like to tell you, that is the furthest thing from my mind. Julie is one of the most humble people I know. So I'd like to just point out, for the record, that i have yet to paint my new aparment. Thoughts? I am totally taking suggestions.