Chimera Song Mosaic
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
 
Timing is Everything

I really feel like summer has officially begun, even though it has been in the high 90s and some 100s every day for the past month here, because well, it officially has, but especially today because I dyed my hair blonde yesterday for the summer Solstice. Also, today is my dog, Lars's, birthday--he's 13! Yay, Lars!

More congratulations are in order:

Congratulations to Marisa, who did not celebrate her birthday in any discernible fashion on June 4th, but who is continually celebrating life every day! (Little does she know it, but we are celebrating this week with star lunches and a majorly indulgent fondue party this Thursday!)

Congratulations to Colleen, whose 30th birthday I witnessed on May 21st, 2005, in Boise Idaho. It was a surprise, and boy was she surprised! Also on the old buddy surprise crew were Audrey, Truman, Simon and Zelia, and Jane, her friend from high school. Colleen is beginning her 30s by launching a new career!

Congratulations to Ryan "Froddo" William, who came into this world on Cinco de Mayo, 2005, and to his parents, Jen and Marty! May the force always be with him, and may he shun the dark side.

Congratulations to Chris, who is now Dr. Murray! Congratulations on accomplishing this monumental feat, and on doing so with such grace, humor, warmth, and aplomb that we know to be inherent to her.

Congratulations to Lars, again, on reaching 13 and still retaining that frisky hop-step and twinkly black nose, all while sporting an increasingly gray belly (rub it!).

Now, with all this put forth, I must also come clean and reveal my future plans; I am moving to Qatar. Lance is already there working, which is the reason why I am doing so much yard work (every week a new challenge!) and otherwise work in general. He has been there three weeks, will be there five more, then will return for August. Then he'll repeat a similar cycle until we move there at the beginning of next year or in the spring. He is doing fine over there and reports they have the biggest and best shopping malls in Doha that he has ever seen, and that he made friends with another expat the same age and build as he who is also named Lance! So we call this guy DoppelLance.

So, I plan to work hard this summer (obviously), write as much as possible, sacrifice myself on the fall semester, which is only what is asked of me, and then write fulltime when we move to Qatar. Maybe also hang out in some Souks and gawk at the Arabian horses. If I must get a job, I shall teach English, perhaps (big surprise!), in which supposedly I can make tons of money. But that's not what I'm looking forward to (well, making money is nice, but the working, not so much). Lance and I both are looking forward to many vacations in fabulous and suddenly more reachable places! You know, Jordan, Syria, Bahrain, UAE, Oman, Yemen, Malta, Eastern Europe, Turkey, southeast Asia (not that close, but we have been wanting to go for some time). Learning a new language, meeting new people, experiencing another culture, etc.

That's all I should write for now since I lost my train of thought, which means I'm not really paying attention and am distracted by another project. I want to get my online grading done this morning, and I think I mentioned the fabulous lunches. Also, I've noticed my writing here has been a little dry lately (not in terms of quantity but in flavor), and that's because I have been simply transcribing things from my head I had earlier intended to post, and that's just not fresh. I think I have got that mostly out of the way, so that frees me to be, well, free.


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