Blah-g

Many apologies for my tardiness.

Frankly, my life has been fairly boring and non-blog-worthy over the past few weeks. Oh, there have been definite high points (the weather, seeing friends again, bowling), but overall, not a whole ton going on.

As previously stated, I am working at Caribou again, which has been a blessing of sorts; they pay me, and in return I wake before the beasts of the field and the birds of the air to get on a bus to go downtown and dispense coffee to semi-comatose businesspersons. This can either be better or worse than it sounds (and the getting on the bus at sparrowfart is ALWAYS worse than it sounds). I am not a morning person. If the Good Lord had intended for us to see the sun rise, He'd have put it in the middle of the day so we could all appreciate it fully. The upside to this little experiment in diurnality is that I get honest-to-goodness weekends off: I seriously haven't had actual weekends off from a job since...ever, I think. The only times I've had weekends to myself were also times when I didn't have a job. A paycheck AND Sat/Sun off? Nice.

For fun I am sleeping. Occasionally going out with friends. Did go bowling three or four times (including the non-traditional St. Paddy's bowl) before completely screwing up my right shoulder (which seems to be healing just fine on its own) and ending that particular form of exercise. A sign, I tell you. All attempts to get me to DDR have been fruitless, and will continue to be so. Been doing some "weight-lifting" the past couple of days in order to increase my buffness to an acceptable level before the Girl comes out this summer. Luckily for me, she doesn't have very high expectations. ;)

Have seen a lot of good friends recently; thanks in part to a "Welcome Back To America" party a couple of weekends ago. Finally got to see Eric again, thus confirming his continued existance, and Brendan got to reconfirm his existance as well, despite some doubts at one point. I've now seen all the former roomies-from-the-ghetto-house, some of the Bethel-roomies (of various eras), and lots of other Bethel-era friends. All seem to be doing well, which is very good.

Living with D and L is very good too; humorus to say the least, and has been very informative into the ways of the fairer sex. D's Mom: current medical research shows it is impossible to get pregnant by brushing your teeth in the same room as a member of the opposite sex. Especially when they aren't even in it at the time. We've all been eating pretty well too; living with two people who actually LIKE to cook makes for some nice dinners, some of which I can even help with. Hopefully my cooking expertise will improve to the point where I can cook Jo something other than instant ramen, fajitas, and pasta. Definitely digging the availability of chocolate milk in this country.

The weather is almost enough to make me wish for Nagoya. Almost. It's currently snowing outside. (Thank goodness. Inside'd be a pain.) It's rained for the past five days, which has been rather miserable. Ten days ago it was 80 degrees F and sunny and we barbecued three evenings in a row. Two weeks before that we had 15-18 inches of snow, with drifts up to my chest. You just can't win with the weather here; Minnesota is mad. I love it.

Speaking of Japan (which I did, kinda), this is just in from the "Geez, I'm Glad I Left When I Did" files: according to Jo and Brendan, there was a British English teacher (or, more accurately, an English teacher from Britain) killed in Tokyo recently. Scary. And, according to the newly-returned Iain, there was a fairly big earthquake just a couple of days (hours?) before he left. Glad he made it out okay. Francis, Brendan, Wong, you guys take care.

The biggest news (for me, at least) is that my grad school applications are in. Yay! Now all I need to do is pray that my offer to pay a university $18,000/year won't be rejected. It's kind of like desperate whoring in reverse. Edinburgh, me love you long time baby.

And that's all the news from Lake Woebegone. At least all the news I can remember; there may be more, but it's 2 and I need to be up in 4 hours. Bah. "Work is the curse of the drinking class."


Currently listening to: "Oscar Wilde" by Romantica.
Currently reading: Garrison Keillor's "Good Poems", having just finished Hemingway's "Islands in the Stream", and looking for a new novel to begin. Suggestions gladly accepted.