This Side of Lost

I've been trying to post all afternoon and evening, but keep finding myself distracted, primarily by renewed evidence that for some reason the Gulf of Mexico has become a destroyer of lives. I will try and string something together despite this.

Things are plugging along here. Samantha and I both find ourselves pretty busy. Which is a little surprising, considering that neither of us are really doing more than we did last semester. I think it's because even though the time spent is probably the same, it's at much more awkward places in the day. Samantha has found herself with no opportunity to sleep in except for every other Monday off. I fear this is taking more of a toll on her than she figured it would.

But we need some sort of income, and contrary to popular opinion, the people in charge of graduate school do not make it financially easy on you. Case in point: My loans still have not come through. I am waiting to be contacted by Financial Aid (as they said they would). I have a credit card bill to pay which has my health insurance premium on it (the full year's worth). The same health insurance, which by the way, does not cover dental. Which is very exciting given that my left back molar is making itself known to me somewhat painfully right now. Yes, I know you have not been looked at by a professional in 14 months, Left Back Molar, now shut the hell up. Daddy's poor.

So, yeah. At least Angus is better. He is eating on his own now, though less than we would like. Hopefully we won't need to pour any more money into him for the time being.

Lest the more snarky of you read the preceding complaints as evidence that I made a bad decision to "shack up" with Samantha (note the severly ironic use of quotation marks), hear this: it is going better than I had hoped. I would be in the same (or worse) financial position if I had not done this. And I have the added -- and enormous -- emotional relief of coming home to someone who loves me, listens to my concerns, cares for me, makes me laugh, and all-around compliments my life better than I ever thought she would. I will take this with a little dose of exhaustion and scarcity any day.

On to better and brighter things. We're looking forward to an exciting weekend:

• Friday: OMG, it's Mari's SLIS Vegetarian Potluck! ("OMG" shamelessly stolen from Davin's invite.)
• Saturday: Maybe a matinee of The Corpse Bridge and IU Opera's first show of the season, Cosi Fan Tutte.
• Sunday: Some tour of Bloomington's historic houses and maybe the symphony.
• And Lotus Festival? How did I miss this? Sigh.

Anyway. Back to obsessing about hurricanes. Peace, friends -- for me and for you.