misspriss.org

Vacation

Buy sunscreen.

Passports? Check.

Plane tickets? Check.

Make hotel reservations.

Arrange for dog sitter.

Drive to the airport? Or cab it?

Bug spray.

Camera.

Laptop.

Traveler’s checks.

Beach reads.

Gifts for host family.

What to pack?

Shorts.

T-shirts.

Clean underwear.

Rain gear?!

Oh no, I have to write a PAPER while I’m gone?

Work is busy.

School is busy.

Home is a messy jumble of undone things.

I’m stressed about going on vacation!

Relax, it’s supposed to be fun.

I think I left my sanity back at the bus stop.

I need a vacation from planning for vacation.

I never thought I’d say this, but I just don’t think I can do this any more. I had good intentions. You had good intentions. But really, those aren’t enough, are they? You’re not sure what to say. I’m not either. I worked so hard to get where I am.  We worked hard, you say? Hardly. You sat there and watched. Went to work every day, oblivious. Did your own thing. You only cared when it caused issues for you. But as long as it didn’t cause any ripples in your little existence, you ignored it. Well, it’s about to cause big waves now. And you could have prevented it. All you had to do was pay attention. Offer a little encouragement now and then. But no, you had to be selfish. Save all the glory for yourself. Well, I’m tired of this. I’m tired of you and I’m tired of this game. No more. I’m quitting as your online poker partner and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.

we observe veteran’s day today, which means i get the day off. boy, do i need an extra day to plan for our upcoming trip and to try and get caught up on homework.

i’m getting so excited about our thanksgiving and christmas trips. i haven’t had a vacation all year. i’ve been saving up my holiday time just for these trips. i cannot wait to visit our friends and to see family.

right now, i want to tell everybody i know that we’re thinking about trying for a family. just the possibility makes me excited. but i need to be cautious, because you never know what may happen. i really want to tell my parents, but feel it’s wiser to hold off. i certainly don’t want to get their hopes up when we don’t even know what’s in store for us. i need to be patient—i haven’t gone off the pill yet! i think it’s wiser to wait until after our trips. maybe after the first of the year. hopefully that will make me less likely to miss classes in my last semester.

you know what i want? the ability to add sticky notes to emails, saying what steps i’ve taken, what things i’ve done so far. it would be especially great for those shared mailboxes, so my partner will know what i’ve done.

why hasn’t anyone made this? if they have, tell me about it.

what’s on your wish list for standard programs? what don’t they have/ do that you would love to see?

woah, ok. it’s finally starting to sink in that we’re going to belize in a little more than a week. when i tell people i’m going on vacation next week, they ask where and invariably shriek “Belize?! OMG! i’m so jealous!!!”

i’ve never been further out of the country than ensendada. this will be my first passport stamp. my first remote island. our first exotic vacation together. and yet, the funny thing is? the closer it gets, the less exotic it feels. and i wonder if i will experience that proustian disappointment where what’s in your mind is so big and built up, nothing in reality can live up to it? i certainly hope not. but the hype has been so big. will it live up to it?

i’m trying to just expect to relax, read, and take a LOT of pictures. but i’m also obligated to do homework while i’m away. ick. oh well, it should still be wonderful to get away, even if i have to write a paper on the beach, in my new bikini.

woah, it’s 90 degrees! did we time warp to august?

i just got buried at work. so now, it’s work & school that are going to make me crazy before vacation. so very stressed right now with all we have to do before we leave. john told me last night it’s supposed to be a vacation, relaxing. if it’s not, i’m doing something wrong.

uh, yeah, thanks. work just piled a bunch of stuff on me before i leave. i have a crapload of homework, i’m at least 2 weeks behind, and with our vacation, i’m going to be 2 more weeks behind. and an asshole professor is assigning a paper the thurs before thanksgiving, due the thursday after. my entire vacation. and he’s assigning the topic, so it’s not like i can start early on it. fucker. i hate that class.

sorry for the rant. feeling a bit like i’m on a sinking ship. and i have no one to blame but myself. i’m the one that signed up for 5 classes. what a dick!

i got to see our friends’ 6 month old baby the other day. oh, the cute! everybody else played with him during the evening and i just enjoyed visiting with my friends. but he woke up late in the night (lots of noise) and his mom decided to feed him for a little bit. after she burped him, though, i finally got to hold him. and i tried to get him to go to sleep. i must’ve walked him around for an hour. he was really mellow, just too much stimulation for him. every time the noisy group would come into the room where we were, i’d move on to a different room (they were having fun laughing and talking). eventually i found a rocking chair and was able to rock him to sleep. i almost fell asleep with him on my shoulder.

did i mention my ovaries hurt? we’ve been talking about whether we would start a family sometime in the future. i have no idea how we’re going to do it. we need my income. our place is small. what if we decide to move? who’s going to work? how will we get a house? it’s all so complicated. and yet i really, really want to try. there are no guarantees that i’ll even be able to have kids. and if not, what then? sigh. i just don’t know.

but i do know i sure enjoyed that little baby head on my shoulder.

i decided to wait on the freewriting exercises, and do them in the latter half of the month. something for me to look forward to.

i really should do that more often. take a subject and do a 5-minute or less timed writing. it’s actually quite fun.

what types of writing exercises do you like to do? have you ever posted them to your blog? if you haven’t, is there a reason? i’m interested in how people decide what to write about. for me, it’s usually just whatever’s bugging me, or what has caught my fancy that day. it’s usually a brain dump. and boring. so what i’m trying to do now is come up with some interesting and maybe even off-the-wall ideas for my writing. we’ll see how it goes.

if you have any suggestions, let me know.

Okay, a step away from the free-writing exercises for a minute (although, really, my entire blog is mostly made up of free-writing).

The schedule for next semester came out this week. So I’m busily trying to fit my life around work and classes in anticipation of graduating. If I’m lucky, I’ll get to take all of my classes on Tues/ Thurs. Of course, I would work those days, too, BUT I would only have to adjust my schedule two days instead of four. And really, the day would be no longer than it is now: 6 am to 10 pm.  But i would have 3 classes in a row. And I’m not sure there would be time in there to grab something to eat. That may be an issue. But I’ll have to find some way to do it. It’s “only” for 16 weeks. And then I’ll be done.

Wow. I’ll finally be a college graduate. I’ve been working on my degree, off & on, for about 6 years. It’s been a slow process since I work full time. But man, am I more focused on my goals than I was at 18. There’s no screwing around, partying, wasting my money. Iit’s all business. And that helps me worry less about what other students think of me. Because I don’t care. I want to make friends, and I have. But i don’t care if the young ones think I’m weird, or a stick-in-the-mud, or old. It doesn’t matter. What they think won’t hurt me or make me veer from MY goals. Gawd, I wish I’d had this confidence when I was younger! NOW I feel like I have the whole world in front of me, like I can do anything I want and actually feel like I can do it, instead of worrying about my inadequacies.

I’m telling you. Being in my thirties ROCKS my face off.