Good news, everyone: My husband is annoying me again! Part 1

So, it's been a while since I posted. A year and a half, perhaps? I did wind up moving to Michigan, but I should specify that it's the U.P., which is more like a shriveled appendage of Wisconsin than a part of Michigan. No offense! It's a super-bumblefuck area (no offense!), which meant that Frank wasn't able to move here until March, and even then, it was really lucky, because he got one of the six jobs available in the town.

The point I'm trying to make here is that we lived apart for a lot of months. Seven. And we got to missing each other. A lot.

He helped me move here last August, the weekend before my teacher training began. When he left that Monday, it involved many tears on my part, but he reminded me that I'd be coming back home in four days. (The upcoming weekend was our anniversary, and we had Twins tickets.) So, after that first week of training, within minutes of being dismissed, I drove my little white Volvo the seven hours to Minnesota. I pulled into Saint Paul late that night, and fell asleep in my old bed in my old apartment with my old man and things still seemed relatively okay.

The Twins won the game and the weekend was normalish, except for me agonizing over making a syllabus for a large percentage of it, and us spending my last morning in town looking at a somewhat crummy (but more affordable) apartment closer to Frank's job in the suburbs. He started the proceedings to sign a yearlong lease, which should have terrified me, since I had just moved to Michigan to start a 3-year school program, but I was in such a daze about everything that it all seemed reasonable. He'd looked for jobs in Michigan, and there was nothing. What else could we do? And surely they'd at least clean the apartment before he moved in. Everything would be fine!

geography update

So...guess I'm going to school in northern Michigan after all. To the third snowiest city in America. I had four other geographical/school choices:

1. humid swampland school

2. cold-and-far-from-home-wingnutland school

3. bleak-desert-border-town-across-the-river-from-the-current-winner-of-the-most-dangerous-city-in-the-world-contest school

4. southeastern-urban-sprawly-military-zone school

Most important factor in my decision: none of these places offered to pay my tuition. Northern Michigan did. So, off I go. To Northern Michigan. Seven hours from home, and a beautiful drive...WHEN THE ROADS AREN'T IMPASSABLE DUE TO WINTER CONDITIONS. waaah-waaaaaa-WAAA-AAAH. (That was a sad trombone, in case you were wondering.)

But seriously. I'm excited. I get to be a teacher and a writer for a while. And shit, I grew up in northern Minnesota, so I have the cajones for it.

northern michigan

So, I have two acceptances to graduate school: Northern Michigan and Central Florida. Guess which one I'm more excited about? I didn't even contact the Northern Michigan people after I received the letter, I just thought, "Of course I got in to Northern fucking Michigan." ...why did I even apply there?

But as time drags on, and I wait for my other applied-to grad schools to make their decisions, I start second-guessing myself, like "Hey! maybe I should give Northern Michigan a chance. Maybe I would be fine dealing with a place like Minnesota, only colder, grayer, and snowier." I head to their website, trying to convince myself it would be okay, and am greeted with the following photograph:





I do not go any further into the website. I make no clicks. This photo seals the deal. Or doesn't, as the case may be.

that's a good one

This article about Tiger Woods cracked my shit up:

A Simple Plan for Tiger Woods: Play Some Golf

disclaimer: I have never in my life thought about Tiger Woods until now, but still found this extraordinarily funny. It's very anti-golf.

addiction

My Craig Ferguson addiction has gotten to the point that I'm regularly late to work, which is due to oversleeping, which is due to watching his show every night until 12:30. And also, I feel a touch depressed when his show ends on Friday night, because I have a whole weekend to wait for my next fix. And also, I shush my husband if he ever talks while Craig Ferguson is talking. So...it's affecting my work performance, my moods, and my relationships. Intervention time?

Nope-rah

I sent in the following tip to Jezebel.com today:

Not sure how timely this is, but I caught part of the Oprah Winfrey Show yesterday, with many of the actors from NINE, and although it features multiple Academy Award winning and nominated women, a lot of the initial banter was about what a genius Daniel Day Lewis is. The similarly talented actresses on the stage did not seem to be getting much respect, much respect at all. The questions to the women were along the lines of, "So...Nicole Kidman, what's it like to be married to Keith Urban? Did you bring your baby to the set?" "So, Kate Hudson, you're dating A-Rod. What's that like?" "So, women, what's it like to work with the great Daniel Day Lewis?"

It was interesting, I thought. Also interesting is how all of these super-talented actresses are starring in this movie together, but the entire plot revolves around the male character.

today

I have a soft spot for songs that talk about the kind of day that the singer had (or will have). They always seem like a good omen to me.

In college, I would have a great day whenever I would start it with a song by Beck featuring the lyrics, "Today has been a fucked up day, today has been a fucked up day, today has been a fucked up day" with different intonations, repeated again and again. That song brought me such illogically good luck.

My current favorite is that Black Eyed Peas song where they say "I gotta feeling that tonight’s gonna be a good night, that tonight’s gonna be a good night, that tonight’s gonna be a good good night." Love it! How could I not get behind that sentiment? And it hasn't failed me yet...every time I hear that song, it's a good night.

The one that started it all, though, was "Today," by the Smashing Pumpkins. "Today is the greatest, day I've ever known, can't wait for tomorrow, I might not have that long..." So Buddhist, isn't it? The Smashing Pumpkins were my number one favorites when I was sixteen and miserable and not fitting in with the kids in the small town where I grew up. I would listen to this song before and after school and feel better. It also has the line "I'll tear my heart out, before I get out." Boy, did I love that. Boy, did that speak to my depressed, teenaged, stuck-in-a-small-town self. I read somewhere that Billy Corgan wrote that song when he was suicidal, which makes a lot of sense. You're in a dark place, and you write a song about deciding to keep living, and it helps other people through the same kind of shit. Not that I was suicidal, but the song helped pull me through bad feelings, day after fucked up day. And now, fifteen years later, I find myself in the city, with some fun friends, and lots of good omens about tonight being a good good night.