I'm sitting here at my 'pad', sweating profusely and smiling in the Nevada-esque summertime heat. Compounding the outdoor temp, I've decided to cook some chicken and pasta to pump more BTU's into my surroundings. Clever.
I've no shirt on. Who cares, I am male right? Well, I'm modest to the extent that I don't usually sleep with less than a T-shirt and boxers on, so you know it's got to be warm for me to bare it in broad daylight. Of course, the crisp-clean tanlines I sport on my arms gives the illusion of a white tee; my lack of chest hair amplifies the illusion.
Life is challenging right now. Five days ago, in the midst of terrible dissapointment and frustration at the Cascade Cycling Classic in Bend, Oregon, life was the proverbial bitch. A fitting paraphrase: went expecting the best form of my life, immediately experienced the worst form of my life, quit the race early and drove home contemplating my wacked out season, training, and ambitions. Thursday afternoon, now.
9.08.2012
These are the days of our lives
Sha la la la. Someone turned the speed way up on this ride... I don't necessarily want off, I just want it to slow down a few notches. Life is busy. Hey, that seems to be a common theme for these last few entries. I've managed to back my workload down to the standard 40-45 hours per week, but am still mentally processing work-related items for the additional 15 hours as before. Does that make sense? Oh dear, I picked a bad day to quit caffeinating.
Lauren I and celebrated three years together this week (THREE!). I figure I might ask her to marry me in another three, perhaps four years. Just kidding. Such an event is emminent and, without letting the cat out of the bag, my heart is racing just typing it out. The night of our anniversary was booked with other activities, but on Tuesday evening we strutted down to Mortimers and treated ourselves to the finest (THE finest) experience I've ever, well, experienced. Seven course meal, each one better than the next and some tasty wine to wash it down with.
Lauren I and celebrated three years together this week (THREE!). I figure I might ask her to marry me in another three, perhaps four years. Just kidding. Such an event is emminent and, without letting the cat out of the bag, my heart is racing just typing it out. The night of our anniversary was booked with other activities, but on Tuesday evening we strutted down to Mortimers and treated ourselves to the finest (THE finest) experience I've ever, well, experienced. Seven course meal, each one better than the next and some tasty wine to wash it down with.
Found a few minutes.
Crikey (sp?), it's almost Christmas. More mind-blowingly, it's almost the end of 2011. I once heard that kids are "time accelerators" for their parents. Understatement of the year. Sometime, somehow, we've rounded the one-year mark as California residents and the two-year anniversary is just a few months away.
Life is good. You can always find things to pick apart (and if you read this much you know that I am the KING of picking things apart) but all is truly wonderful. Lauren is an awesome mom, more incredibly nurturing, generous, loving, selfless, and creative than I could have imagined. I like to think I'm a pretty good dad myself; surprisingly being an engaged father takes zero effort, it's simply something I can't wait to do every day. As I've mentioned before it kills me to have to work and be gone so much during the day, but it distills the time with Emma into high octane (say 180-proof) quality dad-n-daughter time. Makes you appreciate it.
Lauren is awesome, did I mention that? On numerous levels. Example: she has chosen to pursue a post-graduate degree, once again driving towards her dream of teaching. This may mean big changes for us, more importantly this represents a big moment in our relationship. Lauren made some huge sacrifices in supporting this move to California, and it's nice (and validating for her) to let her grab the wheel, hit the gas, and drive this shuttle to our next adventure. Plans and details are still preliminary, but it's in the works.
Gotta run. Emma has yet to fall asleep for her afternoon nap and is starting to wig out. More to follow.
Life is good. You can always find things to pick apart (and if you read this much you know that I am the KING of picking things apart) but all is truly wonderful. Lauren is an awesome mom, more incredibly nurturing, generous, loving, selfless, and creative than I could have imagined. I like to think I'm a pretty good dad myself; surprisingly being an engaged father takes zero effort, it's simply something I can't wait to do every day. As I've mentioned before it kills me to have to work and be gone so much during the day, but it distills the time with Emma into high octane (say 180-proof) quality dad-n-daughter time. Makes you appreciate it.
Lauren is awesome, did I mention that? On numerous levels. Example: she has chosen to pursue a post-graduate degree, once again driving towards her dream of teaching. This may mean big changes for us, more importantly this represents a big moment in our relationship. Lauren made some huge sacrifices in supporting this move to California, and it's nice (and validating for her) to let her grab the wheel, hit the gas, and drive this shuttle to our next adventure. Plans and details are still preliminary, but it's in the works.
Gotta run. Emma has yet to fall asleep for her afternoon nap and is starting to wig out. More to follow.
One Week Old in California
Today, well by about 3PM today, I'll have resided as a California resident for one week. Good lord! After seven days, I am absolutely sure of two things:
1) My job is going to rock. Yessir, despite being mired in the corporation's Human Resources (HR) Hell, I've gotten to play engineer just enough to get a taste for what's to come. And it is looking awesome. Que sobrosa!
2) I am lost without my wife. Life is empty without her, and although we chat on the phone for over an hour each day I still hate coming home alone to my humble, rented, spartan room and knowing I won't get to see her again for a few weeks. This will be hard.
I don't have too much time to expound, but here is a breakdown of my journey to date:
1) My job is going to rock. Yessir, despite being mired in the corporation's Human Resources (HR) Hell, I've gotten to play engineer just enough to get a taste for what's to come. And it is looking awesome. Que sobrosa!
2) I am lost without my wife. Life is empty without her, and although we chat on the phone for over an hour each day I still hate coming home alone to my humble, rented, spartan room and knowing I won't get to see her again for a few weeks. This will be hard.
I don't have too much time to expound, but here is a breakdown of my journey to date:
- Friday (February 26): Left Boise 5AM in newly purchased Saab. Saab drives great, but (surprise!) leaks gas when filled to full capacity. Still averaged over 33 mpg on the trip. Swung through Lake Tahoe, tried to meet up with old girlfriend to no avail, continued over Donner Summit. Note to self: Avoid Donner Summit at all costs for future trips. I'm 0/2 in terms of stress (snow/ice) - free journeys across that wretched area. Landed in Santa Rosa, met up with one and only friend here (to date), slept in his spare room on an inflatable mattress.
- Saturday: Room shopping. Of the five rooms I had lined up, I only viewed two. The other tenants either weren't around (so very professional), or I decided to drive on by after seeing the area. By 3PM I decided to rent a room from a single mom with a teenage daughter and early-20s son that live there part time. Comfortable, but most importantly uber-cheap. Went back to friend's house for the night.
- Sunday: Moved in to room. Spent the day monkeying around with habitation setup and unpacking my crap. Made it out for a two-hour bike ride in this friggin' awesome area. Beautiful. All the locals are complaining about the "terrible winter". It was 64-degrees and sunny on my ride.
- Monday: New Employee Orientation (NEO) at work. Or should I say: Intruduction to Acronym Mayhem (I-AM). Lasted all day, never met my teammates there, but managed to rendezvous for a mighty-fine dinner with my boss downtown. The fed me a 22-oz. Lagunitas Imperial Stout and a massive bowl of curried Saigon noodles. I survived, and even smiled and relaxed a bit.
- Tuesday-Thursday: Training. Paperwork. Very little practical engineering. Did I mention paperwork?
Who blogs these days, anyways?
I'm sick. Hooray for that. Started hitting me last night around the six o'clock news hour; in fact perhaps the cold is less a virus and more a virile reaction to the excessive Republican National Convention coverage. Whatever caused it, I am far from impressed at this cold's attitude and style. Sore throat, general nausea, solid headache. Minor body aches, but they're on the rise and I am not so stoked about the next 24-hours.
Little wonder I have a cold. I have averaged maybe 6.5 hours of sleep for the last, eh, five months. It's not Emma, or work stress even, just staying up too damn late then getting up early to catch up on life (gym time, Boise rental, all sorts of crap). Chronic lack of sleep fed perfectly (in a sinister sense) into a weekend blast back to Boise to host an open house and attempt to find new tenants for our home. The open house was a bust, and being back in a community of comfort flooded me with more emotional energy than my weakened immune system could handle. So, here we are. Sick.
Back in Santa Rosa now. Playing hooky from work today, sort of. There was a huge R and D function at work, where the company rented three greyhound-style buses to cart the department down to an Oakland Athletics baseball game. Sounds fun enough, but even last night, before the cold hit full-force, I was considering bowing out. Something about drinking all day, gorging on corn-dogs hot-dogs fill-in-the-blank-dogs and (above all) being surrounded by workmates for nine hours, returning home at 6PM already drunk then sober then hung over and bloated... eh, pass. Still though, awesome gesture by the company management. Pretty sure my absence will go unnoticed among the hundreds of engineers present. Hopefully...
Gotta tell you that I am confused about life, which I guess isn't much deviation from the norm for me. As last reported, things are working out well here in California but Lauren and I definitely feel the pangs of missing family and community in Boise. My mom drove up from Elko for the weekend in Boise, and I got some solid time in with Greg, G and T. I think sitting on G and T's back porch, sipping decaf and absorbing the sounds/smells/temperature of a typical late-summer Boise evening, G and I settling right back in to the genuine connection we've shared for the last five years... Even the morning of the (failed) open house was too much to handle. Ironic that a typical Idaho morning, 55-degrees of dry summer air, large cup of Joe from Dawson's downtown, maple-bar donut from DK's, and a dozen hot air balloons in the crisp blue sky can make you bummed out!
Still, though, there's a lot to enjoy down here, hence my total confusion and discomfort. Ambivalence, true binary this-side-that-side-of-the-fence ambivalence, is torture for me. If nothing else is gained from this period I life I think I'll be forced to let go of the obsession to have things 100% mapped out and secure. Such structure is impossible, and longing for it now is pointless.
Little wonder I have a cold. I have averaged maybe 6.5 hours of sleep for the last, eh, five months. It's not Emma, or work stress even, just staying up too damn late then getting up early to catch up on life (gym time, Boise rental, all sorts of crap). Chronic lack of sleep fed perfectly (in a sinister sense) into a weekend blast back to Boise to host an open house and attempt to find new tenants for our home. The open house was a bust, and being back in a community of comfort flooded me with more emotional energy than my weakened immune system could handle. So, here we are. Sick.
Back in Santa Rosa now. Playing hooky from work today, sort of. There was a huge R and D function at work, where the company rented three greyhound-style buses to cart the department down to an Oakland Athletics baseball game. Sounds fun enough, but even last night, before the cold hit full-force, I was considering bowing out. Something about drinking all day, gorging on corn-dogs hot-dogs fill-in-the-blank-dogs and (above all) being surrounded by workmates for nine hours, returning home at 6PM already drunk then sober then hung over and bloated... eh, pass. Still though, awesome gesture by the company management. Pretty sure my absence will go unnoticed among the hundreds of engineers present. Hopefully...
Gotta tell you that I am confused about life, which I guess isn't much deviation from the norm for me. As last reported, things are working out well here in California but Lauren and I definitely feel the pangs of missing family and community in Boise. My mom drove up from Elko for the weekend in Boise, and I got some solid time in with Greg, G and T. I think sitting on G and T's back porch, sipping decaf and absorbing the sounds/smells/temperature of a typical late-summer Boise evening, G and I settling right back in to the genuine connection we've shared for the last five years... Even the morning of the (failed) open house was too much to handle. Ironic that a typical Idaho morning, 55-degrees of dry summer air, large cup of Joe from Dawson's downtown, maple-bar donut from DK's, and a dozen hot air balloons in the crisp blue sky can make you bummed out!
Still, though, there's a lot to enjoy down here, hence my total confusion and discomfort. Ambivalence, true binary this-side-that-side-of-the-fence ambivalence, is torture for me. If nothing else is gained from this period I life I think I'll be forced to let go of the obsession to have things 100% mapped out and secure. Such structure is impossible, and longing for it now is pointless.
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