“At some point, there will be nothing else you can do. So sit back, pray you aren’t seated by a screaming child on the plane, and enjoy!”
Category: Humor
“Frugality is misery in disguise.”
– Publilius Syrus
And, suddenly and as inconveniently as it always is, our car needs a $1500 repair. The day before we fly out.
Seriously…plane tickets home for me, plane tickets for both of us to the East Coast, a week in a hotel in London while we hunt for a flat for J., and the food we haven’t even bought yet. Come on, universe, just give us a break.
Thank Jupiter, Odin, and Quetzalcoatl we built up a decent pile of savings against the day of reckoning for grad school and can afford it. Which pile is swiftly depleting. Minions, send me your tips and tricks to spiff up Ramen, I’ll be living on it for the next six months!
You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.”
– Ayn Rand
Floors: swept and mopped
Bathroom: reorganized and purged
Oven: oh dear…
Packing: commenced
Produce: nearly all eaten
Living Room: a disaster zone
Bedroom: not much better
Kitchen: let’s not talk about it
Dry Cleaning Pile: large
Bags of Clothes To Be Donated: three (so far)
Moping/Sulking: over with
Excitement Levels: rising
Stress Levels: ditto
Things Left To Do: legion
Ducklings, we went to work this weekend. And, ducklings, we are tired.
J. has his final check out at work today, we have more things to eat so our fridge isn’t a possessed cesspool of rot and evil when I get back, and we can’t find a garment bag that we were sure was in a suitcase. I’ve started deep cleaning everything so I have fewer things to worry about while I’m gone and things are more pleasant to come home to. The living room is carpeted with piles of clothes and paraphernalia in and out of suitcases. Also! We cleaned the oven just for kicks and discovered [quit reading here, Mum] that the interior is blue instead of black. Let’s not dwell on that. Onward!
“Anytime you suffer a setback or disappointment, put your head down and plow ahead.”
– Les Brown
Kittens, I’m bitter. Talking it over with Peregrine helped, as it so often does, to really organize my bitterness into manageable and coherent issues and I finally realized why I’m so disappointed – you know, besides the fact that my best friend and lover is moving to London without me.
The real problem is that I feel horribly left behind. I gladly put J.’s schooling at the top of my priority list and considered my ambitions and goals on hold and never considered it a burden or bad decision. I still don’t. I can write from anywhere, but there are only a few really great schools for accounting and finance and I was perfectly content to go where he schooling took us, and wherever his jobs will too. But suddenly, I’m not going with him anymore (and yes, I know I am eventually, but just indulge me in this mini sulk, alright?) and I’m not sure how that fits in.
I’ve delayed grad school or other academic ambitions, writing is hard when you can’t really devote yourself to it because you’re earning the bread/bringing home the bacon/whatever, and I’ve stayed an extra three years in my dinky university town waiting for him to catch up to me in schooling. And now, the sacrifice I was willing and glad to make (and still am!) isn’t really paying out the way I thought it would.
I hear you now, “G’DUH, Small Dog. Welcome to life, you whiner.” You’re right, I’m sure, but that doesn’t stop the disappointment.
I’m grateful to have a job, goodness knows not everyone does these days. I’m proud to be able to support my family and keep us out of debt while we finished up undergraduates, internships, and the first few years of marriage. I’m ludicrously proud of J. and what he’s achieved and thrilled about where he got into school…
But what about me?
Yes, I’m perfectly aware of how selfish that sounds, but I can’t help it. What about me and what I wanted and planned for? Three years isn’t a long time in the grand scheme of things, but honestly it has seemed horrendously long to me. I’ve been working a job that I can say I am grateful for and usually enjoy (and you can bear witness that the stories I’ve got out of it are amazing, eh, ducklings?), but I don’t want to be a police department receptionist for the rest of my life. It’s a job without the possibility of promotion or progression. Ditto really for the town we currently live in, and frankly most cities compare unfavorably to London. J. really was the only reason I stayed where I am now…and he’s leaving. I’m having a weird time processing that.
So, I’m bitter. Six more months of slogging (yeah yeah, I hear you again, “Cry me a river, C.”) past when I thought I’d be moving on and forward with our/my lives/life. It’s not the great tragedy I’m making it out to be, I know that, but it’s still not…what I planned. And I hate having my plans messed up!
At the same time, I’m feeling a little smug that I’m holding up as well as I am. I’ve only really whined to Venice, Peregrine, and Hennessy, and in the meantime I have packed up a third of my house to store (the reason for which you will just have to wait and see!), kitted J. out fully in sweaters and suits, researched places to live, made due when Her Majesty’s Government turned our plans on their heads, and generally kept on keeping on. I’m tired, disappointed, but proud and damned effective.
Rant over! Thanks for listening, kittens, you’re all sorts of awesome. But you knew that.
“I just got hit by a wave of sleepy.”
“Huh. I’m scary hyperactive.”
– J. and C.
Today is J.’s last day at work.
This weekend is our last together in our first flat.
Four days left until we fly back to the East Coast.
Nine days until we’re in London.
Things to do: legion.
Gloom and sulking tendencies: alive and well.
However, a few phone calls with friends shows that they are going through their own sloughs and confirms that mine aren’t really that bad, just damned inconvenient. I have not had a child I was babysitting urinate all over a several-thousand dollar harp in addition to having seizures. No kids have conducted a drug deal in front of me resulting in arrest. And good grief, Venice, you’re still laughing, smiling and going to work? You’re a champ.
Packing commences this weekend. Gah.
“I would have to say loneliness is next to uncleanliness.”
– Janeane Garofalo
Today kick’s off J.’s final week at work, which means next week we head back East to see my parents for three whole days, which means two weeks from today we land in London…which means three weeks from today I’m back in the States, sans my husband.
I’m starting to get awfully depressed about the fact, but trying to buck up. I’m useless if an emotional wreck and we’ve still got work to do in getting him settled in the UK…but I can’t promise I won’t collapse into a puddle of wimpy tears when I get home. Dratted immigration law changes!
I got really mopey last night as we cuddled on the couch watching movies – as evidenced by the fact that, when we ran out to get some frozen yogurt at the local froyo bar, I combined sour gummi worms with dark chocolate yogurt, a revolting combination. Obviously my brain wasn’t working due to stress. And then neither of us slept well, me because I was too busy trying to picture what it would feel like going to bed without J. by my side. I can joke all I like about sleeping in the very middle of the bed when he’s gone (usually countered by J. claiming I already do anyway), but the prospect of actually not having him there for months is starting to feel…decidedly crappy. To think, I used to like mostly being on my own!
Cheer me up, kittens. It’s Monday and far to early to burst into tears at work. What’s going on, good and bad, in your corners of the world?
“The day I made that statement, about the inventing the internet, I was tired because I’d been up all night inventing the Camcorder.”
– Al Gore
Haven’t done one of these in a while, but I feel as if I’ve been neglecting you, possums, so here’s some of the latest from around the web – my corner and otherwise. If you have any pretty, cool, or interesting things to share, post them in the comments and share with the other minions.
Janssen has an equally fabulous and talented sister, Merrick, who has a kinda rockin’ sense of style. See here for the reason why I must now head to another state to find an H&M in an effort to recreate her outfit. Also, check out some of her recent commissioned art for a local haunt – it’s nouveau Art Nouveau, brilliant!
Speaking of fashion, watch this charming video and enjoy.
The news that I am a history nerd will surely shock no one here, right? Check out an article on the Smithsonian’s website on attempts to save the Taj Mahal.
Decision fatigue…another term to add to my ever expanding vocabulary of ways to describe my (and some of my nearest and dearest’s) problems and neuroses.
Tom and Lorenzo are back to blogging about their original muse, Project Runway, as well as the ups and down (and crashing failures) of the fashion world. I want desperately for them to be my gay best friends and help dress me on my more blah days.
Since we’re in a London mood these days, here’s a fun Facebook group that shows off the city and allows insiders to give you tips and hints of where to go. There are also pictures of random things that group members find all over the city, like the Daleks!
In related news, J. and I bought the new series of Doctor Who
Drat. It’s true. I’ve been working out steadily for a couple of weeks now. I ache constantly and in some strange places – especially when I let J. tell me what sort of exercises to do and wake up the next morning unable to walk – but I’m determined to stick with it.
And because I’m a habitual self destructive-ist, I’ve got a hankering for this recipe with summer peaches and nectarines. Which wouldn’t be so bad except that I’m sure I’m capable of downing one all by myself in one go.
One of the truly loveliest of my lovely friends, Marie, dropped by with her husband unexpectedly yesterday and we managed to squeeze in a visit that probably cut into the time they should have been spending at a wedding reception, but I was too selfish to let her off easily! The flying visit had only one cloud over it, that she informed me that They (whoever They are) are remaking one of my most favorite campy films, Clue
We’re not the only ones relocating to Europe, Margot’s sister Pinto and her husband are heading to Germany. Also there will be future exciting news on Margot herself, stay tuned.
“Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I assure you, it’s much more serious than that.”
– Bill Shankly
The random yells of “YES!” “NO!” “INTERCEPTION!” “HE WAS TOTALLY IN BOUNDS!” “GO GO GO!” and “TOUCHDOWN!” that have been reverberating throughout the building where we live in victorious/broken male voices.
*Some of which may, or may not have been coming from our flat…
**Specifically me…
“Melancholy is incompatible with bicycling.”
~ James E. Starrs
A curious thing is happening, pumpkins. Driving around campus on various errands the other day I noticed that on a very few trees, a very few leaves are starting to look…not quite…green. Was there a smattering of reddish, yellowish Fall starting to creep through the chlorophyll? Yes, I think so! And the sun, which has been well above the mountains by the time I manage to pull myself out of bed all summer, is now not quite peeking over the crags.
The other way I can tell is the reemergence of weird phones calls to show that Autumn Term has indeed kicked off. For example:
“Uh, police? Yeah, we’ve, like, found this bike in this tree? Can you come get it down?”
Fall is coming, kittens.
What signs are you seeing – or indeed not seeing – that Autumn is near? There’s a crispness in the air this morning, but it is entirely likely that the temperature will shoot up into the 90s again before the day is out. Mixed signals, much, Mother Nature?
“I swear, the freshman get younger every year!”
– C.
We’re currently going through the brief pandemonium of a new term. The roads are clogged – after a summer of near empty streets – as the population of both our university town and campus triples overnight. There have already been several accidents and thefts.
And parents! There have been many rabid parents, helicopter parents, fretting parents, clingy parents, and totally negligent parents. The array of which gives rise to a multitude of headaches and funny stories. Just as the freshman seem to get younger, the parents seem to get more overbearing,
However, I’m currently sleep deprived, stressed, and more than a little anxious about the fact that J. is leaving in two weeks. So I’ll boil down a week’s worth of muffled snorts and eye bugging to handy, easy to read bullet point:
Parents!
- No, we cannot arrange an armed escort for your child to and from the dorms every morning. However we do have a safe walk program, knock yourself out.
- I am terribly sorry that your son left his brand new laptop at the library for an hour unsupervised and it got stolen. But I categorically refuse to accept the charge that we had the ability to prevent that incident or that it’s “all our fault.”
- No, I cannot run a background check on the boys in your precious daughter’s classes/congregation/dinner group.
- No, I cannot call you and give you a weekly checkup on your child unless there is a legitimate medical, psychological, or law enforcement reason for me to do so.
- No. You’re child is not an exception. Really.
Carry on, freshman. Snip the umbilical cord and you’ll do alright.
Small Dog Syndrome 