delayed gratification

Happy 2009 everyone! I hope that so far the new year has been fabulous.

New Year's Eve was not as exciting as I hoped it would be. My plan was to move into my new apartment in the middle of the city and then go down to the river and watch fireworks. On NYE 2007 I was in Melbourne, Australia on the banks of the Yarra sweating like a mad woman and watching the fireworks usher in the new year, so I thought freezing my ass off on the banks of the Meuse on NYE 2008 would be the start of a river and fireworks NYE tradition for me.

But alas, it was not to be. Because lots of little inconveniences all got together to make the day become the exact opposite thing to what I wanted.

First, I woke up to knocking on my door. It was the dorm people asking if I was leaving today, I said yes, this afternoon. Then I was informed that no one would be there in the afternoon so if I wanted my deposit back I had to get everything done before noon. So I knew I would have to rush around and clean and pack everything much more hurriedly than I wanted.

Next, my boss called to say she would not be able to take me to the appointment with the landlord to get the keys because there had been freezing rain overnight and the roads were really, really icy. I said I could take the bus and do the appointment no problem, since the bus company's website did not say that they had suspended service due to the weather.

So I check out of the dorm, and thank goodness they let me leave the 120lbs of luggage I have in the room until that afternoon when the ice melted so I didn't have to lug it all over town. I go to the bus and a nice young man comes to the stop and tells me that the buses are not running because of the ice.

Grr..I call the boss back and we talk about rescheduling the appointment for Friday. Not really what I want to do, but alternatives are running low.

I go back to the dorm and they let me stay 2 more nights there. But, then boss calls and says she's going to try to make the appointment. She is my hero.

Then, all of it becomes moot because the landlord's agent calls and says the previous tenant missed her appointment and did not give back the keys yet.

So, my glorious celebration of the new year was in the crappy dorm room, hearing the echoes of the fireworks down in the city. The flashes of light in the sky behind the tree line reminded me of a WWII TV show or movie, probably because I was in the concrete bunker dorm room. I called some friends and family to wish them happy new year and then went to sleep in the early hours of 2009.

Turns out that the previous tenant had a small fender bender on the icy roads that morning. I got the keys and moved in on Friday. I am loving my new apartment, even in it's current empty unfurnished state. I have more drawers and cupboards than I have stuff to fill them, but I am sure that will not last too long. Turns out the post-Christmas sales here start on Jan 3 and last until the end of January, so I am sure these rooms will be full and my bank account will be empty before I know it.

hurry up and wait

I was hoping to be posting today from my new place in Belgium, telling all about the new job, the people, and my lame attempts at becoming fluent in French.

Instead I am in the living room of my friend's house in the U.S. chewing gum loudly and watching BBC America.

The employment contract is taking its sweet time moving through the proper channels in Europe, so I was unable to get my visa to go and work in Belgium. So we are waiting for the paperwork to go through and instead of starting on Nov.1 I will be starting Dec. 1. I thought about just going and trying to do the paperwork over there, but when I talked to people at the embassy about that option, they were quite adamant about that not being entirely legal. So, I called the airline and have the ticket held until everything gets sorted out.

It's disappointing because I am ready to go, I have everything packed, I have all the papers I am supposed to have from my medical certificate to my FBI background check. And, while I love staying with my friend, I am ready to get back into the swing of things with working and living independently.

So I am trying to look on the bright side, and think of the positive things that will develop during this extra time at home.

A couple of weeks ago, when I thought I was leaving last week, I sold my car. I didn't get as much as I wanted for it, and it was so pretty after I got it all detailed.

But, the rental car I am currently using to get around from day to day has satellite radio, so I have made my car a French zone, and only listen to the French-speaking radio stations in order to get accustomed to the language. Every day I understand more and more of what they are talking about, which eases my stress about adjusting to the language change.

I will get to spend more quality time with dad gathering bread and other food for charity in the mornings. It has been nice to spend time with him doing good things, especially after the drama of having to move out of his house. Every day on the bakery run is interesting, we never know what we are going to get. Apparently life in the bakeries is tough, because one day I found these 2 notes in the carts with our loaves:



I have been able to spend time with childhood friends that I probably would not have been able to do had I left on schedule.

I will get to finish the scarf I have started to work on from my super bright! yarn


I can go through my luggage again to see what I absolutely positively must take with me, because those bags are way to heavy for me to drag around airports and train stations.

getting on top of things

It has certainly been a trying time getting all of my stuff packed up in PA and then moving across the country to hamsterdad's house.

I haven't lived with hamsterdad for about 20 or so years. My parents got divorced when I was about 9 or 10. There was the usual divorce drama (dad was sleeping with my friend's mom, and knocked her up, it was quite a soap opera). In the end, hamsterdad wanted joint custody, he wanted to be a part of my life, which is a great thing, considering other people are not so lucky.

So, the plan was that I would spend night's with hamsterdad (my mom worked the graveyard shift), and then days at Mom's and weekends were split or something, I don't remember it much since it did not last terribly long. Turns out stepmom was not happy at all with the arrangement, she was mean to me and constantly yelling at my dad about the living arrangement. After one particularly traumatic morning where stepmom yelled "you are not her babysitter!!!" to my dad, I had enough. On the way to school, I told my dad never to bring me back to that house again. He asked why, and I told him "Because she treats me like shit and you don't do anything about it".

It was the first time I had ever sworn in front of my dad. I was 10 years old.

And I never set foot in the house again until a couple of years ago when I came to visit Vegas on vacation and I couldn't stay at my friend's house that week.

Now that I am an adult, I can look at the situation from a different perspective. I now understand how difficult it is when relationships end and how hard it is to build new ones. I can see that stepmom had her own issues with her divorce and the fact that her ex basically disappeared from his daughter's (my stepsister's) life was not fair to anyone. I have alot of sympathy for her at that time, and I can understand that she was in alot of pain.

But that doesn't make her behavior acceptable. I did not cause any of the drama in her life, and it was not appropriate for her to take out her frustrations on me. Nor was it appropriate for my dad to sit idly by and let the emotional abuse occur.

20 years is a long time, and in that time I worked through the issues that were born from that time in my life, and I feel that I have forgiven both my stepmother and my father, and also have forgiven myself. Nobody is perfect, and I have grown and changed and learned, and so I felt that I could move into my dad's house temporarily no problem.

Unfortunately, stepmom and halfsister appear to see it differently. I have repeatedly tried to put a forward a friendly face and lend a hand, etc, but have received essentially nothing in return. Things are not quite hostile, but they are no where near civil. Today, I said good morning to stepmom, and she started talking to her dog, not even an acknowledgement. I just don't understand it.

All I can do is keep on truckin' and being friendly, and perhaps eventually they will loosen up. If not, at least I know I only have to put up with it for several more weeks, and I can escape to friends' places.

There is a bright side: Larry the Cat is quite affectionate and appears to love having me here. He especially seems to love me most when I start trying to work on my computer on the couch. And he leaves tons of cat hair on me to make sure I know how much he cares all day long.

Today I am getting a storage unit, since there is not enough room in my tiny room and the cluttered garage for all of my stuff, and I won't be taking all the stuff I brought here with me to Belgium. Not having to step over boxes to get around my room will make me feel much more comfortable.

It's getting better all the time

I have escaped to my best friend's house for the weekend, and it has been glorious to be in a place where people talk courteously to one another and don't go around slamming doors all the time (well, sometimes Nate-dog does, but he's 6, so I don't think it's on purpose).

We've been spending the weekend hanging out in the pool and drinking cocktails to celebrate....drum roll....me getting the kick-ass post-doc job in Belgium!! Yay! Yay! Yay!!!

After the phone interview I was telling my dad how it all worked out, in a very subdued yet excited voice (as it was about 8:30am). Stepmom walks out into the kitchen where my dad is and whispers something to him about 'yelling', and my dad says, 'she's not yelling, she's excited, she just got a job'. There was some other whispers that tempted me to go into the kitchen and say in a full voice, 'do you have something to say to me? to my face?' but the glee of getting a job made me decide that it wasn't worth the effort.

Later she was all smiles and congratulatory, I think because now she knows I won't be there much longer. She was back to her standard door-slamming, ignoring self as the afternoon wore on, though.

Whatever, dude.

The Belgium job should be starting on or around Nov. 1st. Originally Oct. 1 was a potential start date, but I really appreciate having a couple more weeks to get organized for an overseas move. Luckily I just streamlined all of my possessions for the move from PA to Vegas, so I don't have too much stuff to sort through to move, but there is still plenty to do. Anyone out there have any tips for becoming an expat for a year or two?

At the moment I am sorting through the hundreds of photos I have taken over the last few months and uploading them to flickr, including pics from my favorite band's last show ever, the drive from PA to NV, and Burning Man! The road trip and Burn picture sets are still growing, so more will appear there over the coming days.

Sparkle has done a much better job of updating her Burning Man pics in a timely fashion, so if you want to catch a glimpse of some of our adventures, check out her flickr page.

groceries and a nightmare

I was at the store today and saw one of the chefs dressed in his chef coat and chef hat, pushing a shopping cart containing a big cardboard box that had the words "CHEFS HATS" printed on it. It struck me as very absurd and made me laugh out loud at the grocery store.

Also, this morning I had the most revolting dream while I was hitting the snooze button on my alarm clock*.

I must warn you, it's vile.
If you have a thing like a phobia about bugs, don' t read this.
If you are eating right now, don't read this.
If you hate hearing about people's dreams in general, don't read this.

OK, you have been warned.

I dreamt that I was at the beach with some friends, we were laughing and enjoying the ocean, boogie boarding and surfing and such, and then it was time to get out. I started swimming for shore, and then got to the end of the ocean, which was surprisingly tiled like the edge of a swimming pool. I was trying to hoist myself out of the water next to a couple who were starting to make out. I was attempting to get out and not disturb them but I accidentally bumped the guy and disturbed their, ahem, activities. At first they were irritated (as expected) and then they noticed some small bumps on my arm.

"Oh, you swam through sea spiders" she said and pointed to my arm. I looked and there were three little bumps on my wrist, that kind of looked like fire ant bites after they pop.

The woman grabbed my wrist and then sucked on the bites. I was disconcerted that a complete stranger was sucking some bug bites on my arm, but that was only the beginning. After she sucked on the bites for a few seconds, she stopped and then spit out the TINY BUGS that were INSIDE the bite on my skin. (UGH!!).

She then told me that I would need to suck the rest of the bugs out of the other bites that were on my other arm because they could grow there and be dangerous.

I warned you that it would be gross. But anyway,

I thanked the lady for telling me about the sea spiders and then noticed that there were some stairs out of the ocean so I could get out of the water easier than hoisting myself up and out over the pool ledge. I went to the beach house with my friends and while they all took naps I attended to my bug bites.

By this time the bugs were bigger and I was squeezing little centipede like creatures out of the bites. I found one large bite that had about 10 creatures in it, and they flew out of the bite on one arm and onto my other arm, where they magically grew into inch long centipede-y creatures that started trying to BORE INTO MY ARM!!!! I had to keep these centipedes from rearing up and boring their heads into my skin, being careful to get their head out so it wouldn't go into my arm and get lost in circulation. Also, if I accidentally took the head off of a centipede before it bit me, the next segment would automatically become the new head. I kept peeling the bugs off of me and throwing them in the sink, trying to be very quiet because my friends were napping.

I woke up completely grossed out about the idea of BUGS UNDER MY SKIN! YUCK!

Sorry, but if anything deserves unabashed use of capslock BUGS UNDER SKIN sure does.

*shudders*

I went to sleep worrying about not doing enough work this weekend and enjoying myself too much. So I suppose my dream punishment for hanging out at the dream beach with dream freinds was bugs under my skin.

The internet tells me that insects and spiders in dreams symbolize worry, so perhaps my worried thoughts when going to sleep started it.

Also I had just read the story in the Onion about a caterpillar on a rampage. My bugs looked an awful lot like a hairless, flesh-eating caterpillars. I'm just sayin.

Well, I hope your days and nights have not been filled with flesh eating bugs.

Sweet dreams.

*for the, like, 10th time

travelling shoes

Before Basil's demise, I spent much of last week and last weekend trekking to major metropolitan areas for work and fun.

For fun I went to Philadelphia and saw Eric Hutchinson with Frogweiler. She and I first saw him at the Tin Angel as an opening act. It was just him and his guitar, and we liked what we heard. Now he has a band and we heard one of his songs in a promo before the Sex and the City movie. I talked to him after the show and told him that we had been going to his shows for a while and it has been a good time seeing him grow in his music and success. I am thinking that the next time I see him (in California *fingers crossed*), he'll be too big to hang out at the merch table after the show. Who knows.

I also ventured near the city of brotherly love for work. I was at the Villanova campus, which was quite lovely, even with the crucifixes in the classrooms. Then later I went to Arcadia University (formerly Beaver College, heh, heh, beaver). That university had a gorgeous campus, centered around this castle.
I decided that if I ever build a university, I will definitely have a castle put in. And, as far as castles are concerned, the one at Arcadia is very well designed because I could not get into that place! Every time I turned a corner expecting a door, there was none. I felt a bit like I was disappointing my viking ancestors by not instantly gaining access to that fortress. Perhaps my true talents lie in seafaring.

Frogweiler and I again joined forces to journey into Manhattan to see Sondre Lerche. The drive in was pretty smooth, with the usual hold up at the Holland tunnel because Frogweiler still does not have an EasyPass! The music at the show was great, Sondre Lerche give such a positive energy to the crowd that I always love. What I don't love, however, is lower Manhattan when it is warm and humid on a Sunday. Warm and humid in any place on any day does not make me happy, but this is a special case.

You see, the music Frogwieler and I love is usually played at places in Manhattan below, say 14th St. Oh yeah, we're downtown girls. Also, many of the shows we have seen also happen to fall on Sunday nights. Sunday night also happens to be garbage night in the east village and everywhere between there and the holland tunnel. So, the warm, humid weather kind of, shall we say, accentuates that special 'city smell'.
It makes the stickiness that everyone feels in the humid weather feel extra dirty, so it is not my favorite.

The garbage on the streets is not something that tourists flock to see, so we decided that this weekend we will venture into the city again to take a photographic tour of weird places to see while in New York (this time on Saturday). For example, I think we may start at Canal Rubber because if it's in rubber, they have it! Basically we are trying for off-off-off-the beaten track, but not so off the beaten track that we get mugged.

Plus, I am bringing the zombies, so if you have any suggestions for where we must go, let me know! Dingo, do you have any tips?

A few days late

It's been a busy couple of days, so my Thursday blog entry was delayed until today.

Thursday was full of meetings and classes. I had my first belly dancing class in a while, and it literally kicked my ass. It had been too long since I did that many hip-lifts. I wasn't able to go to the Jan-Feb session, so I missed learning the dance that almost everyone in the class already knows. It was suprising, but welcome. During my last class I was feeling like I wasn't learning anything new, and now I have a lot to learn.

Then I went to see my favorite local band, and ogled the cutie pie young drummer. He is adorable, but 8 or 9 years younger than me. I have fun flirting with him when I run into him around town and during the early part of their show, but once 12:30am hits the crush evaporates fast. 12:30 is the time when drummer boy's young friends abandon the bar down the street, whose specials end at midnight, and come check out the show.

While I love that my favorite band is getting a bigger audience and is probably making more money because of this, the kiddies annoy the hell out of me. I mean, I did my fair share of getting obnoxiously drunk with my friends and making out in bars in my twenties, but I am done with that. Some may say that it means I am getting old, but I prefer to think that now I just know better.

On Friday I was away at a professional development conference for graduate women in science and engineering. Most of the women there were in engineering, so that was slightly disappointing, but the sessions themselves were great. Everyone there was excited to be there, and the genuine desire to help other women advance in science and engineering was evident. Each of the women who spoke during the day explained how the journey to success is not easy, and can change direction many many times without warning. All of the women stressed that the most important thing was to make sure to do things that made us happy and fulfilled. They not only dedicated time to advancing their careers, but also made sure to take time for personal development as well.

I am starting to look for my next job after graduation, so the conference gave me plenty of food for thought.

bullshit blinker

I've decided that the next time I buy a new car, I am going to make the salesman guy show me how to change both front turn signal light bulbs (or headlamps, whichever). If it takes more than 15 minutes to do the task, I am not buying the car.

I love my car, but I forgot that the last time I had to change any light bulbs on the front driver's side, I had to remove the battery to access the damn thing. That's a bit of a hassle for DIY, so I am going to take it in to the shop and have them do it (one of my brakes is squealing also, so I need to go in).

But still, I should not have to take my car into the shop to change a light bulb.

First Weekend Back

It's been a week since my triumphant return to the U.S., and the jet lag combined with trying to do too much all at once has been taking its toll on me. It also didn't help that I either caught the cold that was going around Melbourne before I left, or someone on one of the planes or in the airports gave me a fun head cold.

But I sucked it up and spent the weekend at a fabulous music festival, listening to some great music and escaping death.

On the whole, it was a great weekend, I saw great music, spent quality time with friends, and read the Harry Potter book (yay!). But I did not escape a run of bad luck. Many things went wrong this weekend. Most of them could have been much, much worse, so I was able to look back and laugh at it all, but still, it was slightly more than I needed to deal with:

Friday: I left my ATM card in the ATM. I completely blame the jet lag and also the fact that there was a horrible, high-pitched tone in the room where the ATM was, so I wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. The tone was so bad it apparently overpowered the beeps that the ATM machine makes when you leave your card in the machine. I called and canceled my card and will get a new one.

Saturday: A drunken crackhead drove his SUV into the crowd I was in at the music festival. I'm not kidding. You can see the news coverage here. We were relaxing on our picnic blanket while waiting for the next band to start and all of a sudden we hear screaming and a SUV is barreling down the hill. Luckily people jumped on the sides of the car and made the driver divert AWAY from the crowd. It's even luckier that the stage was dark because if it had happened 15 minutes earlier or later, there would have been hundreds of people in the crowd, and people would be dead. Crazy!

Sunday: I was dog and cat sitting for friends that were out of town, and when I was bringing the dog in, one of the cats got outside. It was late at night and I was freaking out, since I love my friends very much and don't want to be the one responsible for the loss of a beloved pet. I kept going outside and calling the cat, using the whole shaking the food in the food dish trick. The cat came back the very next day, slightly damp (it was raining) but otherwise unscathed. Luckily it was the cat that likes me, and not the one who I feared was going to kill me in the night, so I was able to get her to come up onto the porch and pick her up to take her back inside.

Monday: After the immense relief of the relief of the prodigal kitten's return, I went into work to find that Pomegranate, my newest betta, had jumped out of his bowl. He was sitting dried up and dead right on my desk to welcome me to work for the week. Alas, poor Pommie, I hardly knew you.



Pomegranate
March 2007 - July 2007
R.I.P.

It's been quite an emotional rollercoaster of a weekend. Hopefully things can remain relatively calm for the rest of the week.

One other thing

What the hell is up with the U.S. Dollar?

It has been getting weaker and weaker.

So weak, in fact, that if I had exchanged all of my money when I first got here at the beginning of May, I could probably have sold back my Australian Dollars when I got back to the US and made a profit.

A year and a half ago, when I was living here, the 1 AUD was about 0.75 USD, now it is close to 0.86USD, which is the highest it has been in the last 18 years.

I'm already a poor grad student, I was hoping to get some good deals shopping while I was here, but alas, the exchange rate is actually not really in my favor anymore. Yes, one U.S. dollar is worth more than a Australian Dollar, but they charge a little more for things here, so it really ends up being about even now.

Bugger.