July 10, 2011

  • My husband and I took a trip back to our meeting place for a friend’s wedding last weekend.  The town was just as I had remembered it in the summer.  The streets were empty and there was what I will term a “gentleness” in the air.  Everything was quiet and relaxing.  Everything just felt safer and more inviting than where we live now.  I miss it terribly.

    We planned the trip so that we could also catch up with old friends.  We stopped by our old stomping grounds and got bubble teas at our favorite dessert shop.  We had been gone for over a year, but I still remembered all the roads and scenery.  It was like we never left.  In a lot of ways I wish we never had…

    When I finish this epic journey toward my PhD, maybe we can move back there, start a life there.  Maybe I can become a professor at my Alma Mater.  Maybe our children can grow up happy and safe in a quiet midwestern town that isn’t suffering from gang violence filtering in from Chicago and East St. Louis.  I hate it here.  I can’t wait until this is all over.

    I think the visit back was a catalyst for a much greater problem:  WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?  I’m always the one preaching that you should be happy, and if you aren’t you should eliminate what is making you unhappy from your life without a second thought.  But I don’t practice what I preach.  Graduate school makes me unhappy, mostly because of my adviser and the jaded attitude it’s giving me and the other students.  Dating makes me unhappy, what with polyfidelity being one of the most FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE THINGS anyone can ever try to pull off in their lifetime.  Even being at home makes me unhappy, because all I do at home is eat, waste time, work out, and then weigh myself and freak out because I weigh 122 lbs. instead of 120 lbs.  I feel like I’m on the verge of a mental breakdown again and I don’t know what to do.  What can I do?  I’ve brought all this on myself.  I chose this place.  I chose graduate school.  I chose my adviser.  I chose to walk the path of polyfidelity.  I chose everything that is in my life right now.  There is no one to blame but myself.

    Mike told me he would follow me anywhere and he tells me he is happy, but I know I cause him pain.  Every time I find a girl to date she hurts us.  One had a boyfriend when we started dating her, one was a prude and then cheated on us, one needed way too much alone time, and many others never got farther than us being interested in them because people can’t fathom being in a triad.  I know it hurts him every time, and that hurts me the most.  If it wasn’t for me, he wouldn’t have had to experience all that pain and suffering.  He tells me that his life would be much worse without me and I know that is true.  My life would be absolutely horrible without him.  But both of us would be better off if I could just give up my bisexuality and my polyamorous feelings.  He’s never said anything like this to me, but I always think it.  “If only I were normal.  If only I could settle for a normal job.  If only we could leave this place RIGHT NOW and start our normal life.”

    I hate myself.  I hate myself.  I hate myself.

    If only she had said yes.  If only we could find another partner here.  If only there was some justification for all of  this torment.  Maybe then I could feel okay again.  In the last few days I’ve stayed home from work several times because I knew I would cry if anyone talked to me.  I feel like I’m falling apart.  I’m definitely falling apart.  I’M FALLING APART AND IT’S NO ONE’S FAULT BUT MY OWN.

July 3, 2011

  • I took a five day (26th – 30th of June) trip to Vancouver for the American Society of Engineering Education Annual Conference.  Vancouver is a lovely city (aside from a couple minor detractors) and the conference was a great networking opportunity for me as I had expected it to be.  However, the trip was absolutely awful.  Let me list the reasons why (And yes, a lot of this will be unjustified complaining on my part, but it’s my blog!):

    1.  Mike wasn’t with me.  For him to have come with me we would have had to pay another $1500 in plane tickets and we just weren’t prepared to do that.  Looking back, I almost would have paid the money to have him with me, especially because both of us severely underestimated the crippling effects of being without the other for the duration of the trip.

    2.  I absolutely hate flying.  I throw up.  I hate people being really close to me.  They smell funny almost inevitably.  The toilets scare me.  Everything about them is awful.  This occasion was no exception.  Between the guy who leaned over me to “look out the window” and instead grabbed my boob and the Brazilian guy who woke me up over and over to point out the window while I was trying to sleep through the flight, all FOUR of my flights were terrible.  Also, I had layovers at DFW and Texas is one of my most hated states.  Ugh.

    3.  I was all alone in my hotel room.  This might not sound that bad, but when all you do is watch Canadian television by yourself and eat the random assortment of food you managed to come by at a local market, it gets kind of depressing.  Sometimes I feel like after a certain amount of time not speaking that I’m going to forget how to speak.  Being alone for long periods of time just makes me nervous.  Maybe I’m a big baby, but whatever.

    4.  My traveling companions had their own agendas, so I spent much of the conference wandering around by myself.  This was okay, except sometimes it’s nice to have someone with you to speak with, look at stuff with, laugh at things with, etc.  Otherwise when funny or sad things happen, you suddenly realize how alone you are.  For example, I walked along the water’s edge and into a local park.  As I passed an old man on the walkway, he farted REALLY LOUDLY and I almost burst out laughing.  But then I realized there was no one to laugh with me and I would probably just end up making the old man feel bad with no happiness gain myself from sharing the moment with someone else.  It got pretty depressing.

    5.  People who speak “The Queen’s English” sometimes pretend that they can’t understand you to inconvenience you because you are American.  One particular guy is my prime example.  I came into a coffee shop looking for a caffeinated drink to keep me going for the day (after a long and fruitless search for a bubble tea that I won’t get into because I’ll sound like a whiny emo kid with too many white people problems).  On the menu, one frappe flavor was called “frosted” and I wasn’t sure what that would taste like, so I asked.  The guy literally what I had said like five times and when I just gave up and ordered something he went to the back and told me they were all out of everything.  Then a Canadian person walked up with an extremely light accent, almost imperceptible.  He immediately made a frappe for him RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME and smirked at me.  I guess he assumed since I had an event badge around my neck and an American accent that I wouldn’t be around long enough to complain about his horrible service.  People can be such assholes.

    6.  I took some pictures, but they were all during the daytime and not far from the conference center because I was too afraid to go out alone for sightseeing.  I felt way too nervous without Mike around to really do anything at night, and I was only brave enough to go within walking distance of the conference during the day without him.  I got some pretty pictures, but I’m sure I would have gotten much nicer pictures farther from the conference.  At least a nice old couple look a picture of me next to a Vancouver sign so that I didn’t have to try and take pictures of myself, which would have made me feel even more lonely.

    7.  The conference was international and therefore phone calls and texts were very expensive.  I couldn’t call and talk to Mike or my parents or anyone for more than a few seconds, and because the hotel I was staying at only had free wi-fi in the lobby (I guess at least they had it SOMEWHERE) I would have to carry my computer and cord downstairs and sit right next to the foot traffic of people coming into the hotel to have any kind of interaction with anyone back home.  One night I was so depressed that I was on the verge of tears and I very nearly paid the $15.95 it cost for one day of wi-fi in a hotel room just so I wouldn’t have to go out in public with red eyes and a snuffly nose.  Basically, being in another country just compounded the loneliness I was feeling by like 50 times.

    Like I said, the city was very beautiful and the conference was wonderful for networking, but I would have enjoyed it a million times more if only Mike had been with me or if it had been in the states instead of international.  I guess I never realized how incredibly susceptible to being alone I am.  Well, now I know and I’ll never go anywhere without Mike every again if I can help it.

    Something else that this conference made me realize is that if I’m willing to have a long distance relationship with someone, I ironically don’t actually care about them that much.  Otherwise, I would vehemently oppose the situation on the grounds that I want to be with them and that’s why I’m in a relationship with them.  How people do long distance shit is beyond me.  Maybe I’m too needy, but I have no desire to spend time away from my partners.  “Me time” holds no interest to me.  I chose Mike because I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him, not sometimes see him but mostly keep to myself!  I think a lot of times people choose a partner because they are attracted to them first and because they find them enjoyable to be around second, but I think it should always be the other way around.  One of my ex’s once said “I thought about dating [insert person's name here] when I first met her, but I never acted on it and now we are too good of friends to date.”  WAT?  There is no such thing.  As I’ve said before, true love is your best friend who you are also attracted to in my opinion.  The better friends you are before you date, the better chance you have for a successful relationship.  Looks fade, attraction fades, but the deep understanding of one another that comes from being best friends for a lifetime will never leave you.

    Speaking of relationships, the girl I messages a while ago replied by saying no in the nicest way possible.  She said she loved us both and wished she could do what we do in terms of relationships, but couldn’t see herself in that kind of situation.  She ended the message by saying she would definitely come visit us soon, etc., etc.  It was very kind, but it was still a no.  And because she replied while I was in Canada and Mike and I were both deep in a spiral of loneliness without the other, neither of us was really in a good place to mentally or emotionally deal with rejection from someone we were so interested in.  I think we are over it now, but it’s made me rethink my life choices a bit.  I began this quest for a woman in our relationship because I thought it would bring us even greater happiness than we already had…but maybe I was wrong.  All I’ve gotten out of the pursuit of polyfidelity so far is pain and sadness.  And if gay marriage is still looked upon so unfavorably in this country, when will polyamory EVER be accepted?  I’m beginning to feel a lot like Don Quixote, sending myself on a fool’s errand because I’ve convinced myself that it will be fruitful in the end.  I think I need a break from my quest.  Maybe I’ll take a couple of months to reevaluate what has happened so far and if it really is worth it to continue on in the hopes of finding another person to share my life with.

    I’ll post about my trip back to Columbia later on as I’m quite hungry now and this post is certainly long enough without the additional explanation.

June 25, 2011

  • We knew we had to say something, especially after what happened Thursday night.  We had to let her know that worthwhile people care about her, not just that horrible piece of shit from her past.

    We wrote a (stupid) message to her.  We profusely edited a (still stupid) message to her.  I talked to her friend about the situation on facebook and she told me to follow my gut.  She’s actually a super chill person and I’m glad we kind of got her “approval” before sending the message.  We still weren’t sure if we should send it.  Finally I just hit the send button like pulling off a bandage.  Here’s what we ended up writing to her:

    Oh my gosh I’m so nervous, but here goes…

    Mike and I had a really great time visiting you Wednesday and Thursday. You’re so much fun to hang out with and you’re also really cute. Originally we thought of you as just a friend, but now that we’ve gotten to know you we think we might interested in being more than friends. You seem like you have a lot of the same ideas about relationships and stuff that we do. We know you’ll be in Chicago for the rest of the summer. If you want to wait to start anything until you get back to Chambana, we understand. If you aren’t interested, just let us know and we’ll forget about it.

    I know this message might come as kind of a surprise, so if you’re wondering about anything feel free to ask. We don’t wanna stress you out or make it weird to hang out with us. We just wanted to tell you how we are feeling since we just realized it ourselves.

    <3 Katie and Mike

    P.S. I hope this message isn’t too creepy… We spent kind of a lot of time trying to make it sound not stupid and I think we still failed.

    Reading it over I feel so embarrassed!  It sounds so stupid!!!  FUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!  Well, what’s done is done.  She hasn’t responded yet, probably because she hasn’t been on facebook in a little while, so I’m really nervous to see what she says.  Actually, that’s kind of a lie.  I’m not nearly as nervous as I usually am about this kind of stuff, but I think that’s because I know no matter what we won’t lose her friendship (and her friend confirmed that).  She’s just not that kind of person to abandon you for things like this.  Mike, on the other hand, is really worried that she’ll say no, but it’s not because he thinks we’ll lose her friendship.  It’s because he is absolutely smitten with her (as am I) and he just doesn’t want to imagine a reality where she says no.  I understand that, but I’m worried he’s going to get hurt.  You have to prepare yourself for the best AND the worst, not just what you want to happen.

    Anyway, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.  It’s always the waiting part that kills me.

June 24, 2011

  • I just got back from Chicago with a stupid email from my adviser waiting for me to ruin my day.  I’m really getting sick of his passive-aggressive shit at this point, especially when I just got amazing results and spent the trip analyzing it in the car and while Mike and my friends were asleep.  Here’s the email:

    Dear All,

    I would like to clarify expectations regarding work hours and general group policy. Before I can do this, it would greatly help if you can tell me about your current work habits.

    Please respond to this email and let me know your current work hours (daily), and if there are any “special” circumstances or work habits.

    Thank you,
    [insert adviser's name]

    Basically, he told us all we could keep our own hours as long as we were making progress.  Since that statement, he has sent a bunch of emails really similar to this, usually right after someone is out of town for even a 24 hour period without telling him.  This time I’m sure it was spurred on by me and it pisses me off!  I get my work finished!  I work hard!  In fact, the day before the trip I stayed at the lab for 12 hours to make sure that I wouldn’t need any of the software we have while I was traveling.  I signed up ahead of time for microscope time tomorrow and Saturday so I would hopefully get some data to analyze on over the ASEE conference.  I have always been a very driven and self motivated person.  You have to be to get into graduate school!  But here he is questioning my (and my coworkers’) work ethic at every turn!  And you know, even if you would have been glad to do someone otherwise, the instant someone insists that you do it you don’t want to anymore.  It’s just such a stinking pile of bullshit.  He has no idea how to manage a group of graduate students.  That’ll teach me for picking an adviser who’s still trying for tenure.

    Every time he sends one of these stupid emails it makes me think EVEN HARDER about switching to a different lab after I get my masters.  I mean seriously, fuck him!

    Anyway…now that I got that out of my system…

    The visit with my…I’ll call her my “current crush” because I get so giddy about hanging out with her that it’s like a high school crush.  The visit with her was pretty much awesome, especially the time before we picked up her friend (who is also pretty cool).  We were all just driving around and hanging out, and we started talking about relationships and things and she really opened up.  We were talking about past relationships, good and bad, and it made me feel really comfortable.  She must trust us.  I feel like that is the first step in any relationship.

    However, the problem is we’re about as smooth as sandpaper, both of us.  I’m awful at saying the right thing at the right time (like thinking someone is pretty when I see them, but then waiting to say it until I feel awkward just saying it, and then just giving up and not saying it), and Mike is so shy that he often avoids physical contact even though he really really wants it.  Consequently, I think we can sort of come off as disinterested.  She seemed so open and interested when we first arrived, but as time when on (and probably because her friend was also there) she got a bit distant.  Thus, I analyze everything I said and did, wondering if I did something wrong or if she wasn’t interested in the first place or if I’m overanlayzing everything by wondering if I’m overanalyzing everything, etc…

    So who knows?  I had a lot of fun.  It was a good trip, but I’m left with this sinking feeling that I did something horribly wrong (even though I’m sure I didn’t).  She let us borrow Silent Hill and Silent Hill 2, so I figure after I beat one of them I’ll send her a facebook message about it and maybe sneak in some kind of subtle comment about a possible relationship.  She’s really awesome, even more because of some of the conversations we had about love, relationships, and family values.  I shouldn’t be this nervous about everything because I know even if I tell her Mike and I are falling for her things won’t get awkward.  Even if she isn’t interested I don’t think she would stop hanging out with us.  She’s way too chill for that kind of thing…at least I hope…  Okay, seriously, I need to stop freaking out.

June 21, 2011

  • Holy shit, so I had an amazing day in the lab yesterday.  Everything that had been going wrong inexplicably suddenly worked perfectly!  I got the data I had been trying to get for a couple months!!

    My excitement faded quickly, however, when I realized how complicated and tedious data analysis was going to be.  Unfortunately, no one in the lab has developed any type of automated program for the kind of thing I’m doing, and while we have some helpful programs they still require a lot of user input to function.  Makes me wonder if trying to program something would actually save me any time realistically.  Well, since I’m no wizard at programming I think I might resign myself to using the programs we have and focus my creative efforts into my experiments.  That will probably produce better results in the end.

    Tomorrow morning I have to get up and get ready to go visit our lady friend in Chicago.  I’m really excited, but at the same time I know I have a lot of work to do, and I’m going to Canada on Sunday, AND I’m going to a wedding the weekend after I get back from Canada!  So much travel at such a crucial time in my research.  Who knew that I would just happen to get amazing data two days before my travel schedule goes haywire…

    At least my life is pretty awesome right now.  There’s always that.

June 19, 2011

  • I think I deleted a good photo accidentally.

    I forgot my camera yesterday and it makes me really sad!  Between the BBQ and the birthday drinking (the two events were unrelated, by the way) so many photo worthy moments transpired!  Fireworks and being able to drive an extremely drunk birthday girl home were the highlights of the evening.  Additionally, my most recent ex came to the birthday barcrawl and I had no problem talking to her at all.  In fact, I probably felt more comfortable talking to her knowing that we weren’t romantically involved.  Sometimes things work out just the way they should, I suppose.  :)

    Ice cream!

June 18, 2011

  • It’s very difficult to take a picture of one’s own arm hair.

    In a couple days we are traveling to Chicago to go visit the girl who gave me her phone number a while back.  Since that entry we’ve actually become rather good friends, gone to an anime convention together, and generally gotten to know one another a bit better.  I have no idea if she’s interested in us romantically, but because I just broke up with someone I’m probably imagining things because I miss being in a relationship.  Consequently, I’m wondering if anything will happen when we go up to visit.  Since I originally met her on a dating site, I guess I’m just a bit curious.  She did hug us both last time we saw her, but I feel like lots of people do that and it doesn’t really mean anything.  So who knows?  We’ll see when the time comes.

    Regardless of what transpires, I’m excited.  And I’m in a good mood today for no apparent reason, which is a nice surprise.

    Time to watch more Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Netflix.  :3

June 16, 2011

  • It’s so stereotypical to get back into the mood to blog when you are feeling down.  I’m so stereotypical.  Funny that a friend just posted a xanga entry on facebook in which he proposed to a girl.  Spoilers: she said yes!  If only that’s what this entry was going to be about…

    Sometimes I shake myself mentally out of these kinds of funks and remind myself that my life is by no means hard or sad.  Sometimes I can remember all the good things I have and decorate my daydreams with them so vibrantly that I don’t even remember why I was sad in the first place.

    Sometimes I can’t.  This is one of those times.  The last post I made was over half a year ago and since then a lot has happened.  I don’t really know where to start, so I won’t.  The bottom line is I made another mistake.  I talked about the last one I made, being too trusting and all, and this time I will admit the mistake was much less pronounced…but I still made it.

    Desperation.  That’s all I can call it.  A feeling in the pit of my stomach so intense that it can’t be ignored.  Instead of approaching relationships with the frivolous glee that most people do, I attack them like a frenzied animal who has been cornered in the back of a cave.  Dating Mike was no different.  I don’t let things happen, I MAKE them happen.  I make them happen because I have to.  I can’t wait for someone to come to me because no one ever will.  My relationship desires are too complicated, too abstract, for someone to simply fall into my lap.  It’s all well and good for the movies, but for me, it has never happened.

    Because of that, when I do identify someone as a possibility I tend to be…too lenient, shall we say.  I let things slide because of how rare it is to find someone, anyone, who fits the requirements Mike and I have.  And that’s good, to an extent.  One has to be flexible in a relationship, but to a point.  Upon discovering what I would call “fatal relationship flaws” I don’t give up.  I let them slide and keep going, hoping that ignoring the problems will make them go away and return me to the excited joy that comes with falling in love.  Lucky for me Mike didn’t have any fatal relationship flaws, thus the marriage and all that jazz.

    However, we all remember (and by “we” I mean me because I don’t think anyone really reads this anymore) what happened in some earlier entries.  That relationship had so many red flags and fatal flaws that looking back I just want to go back in time and snap myself out of it.  I did learn a lot about myself in the process, but it seems I didn’t learn enough.

    I did it again.  I broke up with our most recent girlfriend yesterday.  I’m feeling pretty down about it.  There is a silver lining, though.  Instead of letting it go on for months, I broke it off a few weeks after realizing the relationship had too many fatal flaws.  I’m getting better.  Maybe next time I’ll be able to recognize the red flags right away and talk about them as soon as they come up instead of letting them fester, even for a few weeks.

    Maybe next time there won’t be any fatal flaws.

    Maybe.

    So, in summary, if I seem a bit down it’s just because we’re girlfriendless again.  But this time, the anger, the bitterness, and the deep depression were all circumvented by the timing.  It’s better.  I can say confidently that I will have no trouble hanging out with her in the future.  She didn’t lie to me.  She didn’t cheat on me.  She didn’t lead me on with her emotional vacancy.  She just wasn’t quite the right fit, but not because she did anything wrong.  And it’s better.  It means I’m getting better at identifying possibilities and abandoning the fatally flawed.  It’s better.  It’s better.  I’m better.

    My, but what a terrible blogger I am.  I still haven’t told you anything about the girl I got the phone number from, as she isn’t the girl I’m talking about here.  What an interesting tale I’ve deprived you of.  I’ll have to fix that soon.

December 14, 2010

  • Rats

    The rats are so cute!  Frank is black and white and is the chunky one because he loves these little yogurt treats we feed them when they come out of the cage to play.  Chuck is beige and white and is the playful one who loves to run and explore and climb.  It makes me happy that they have already developed recognizable personalities!  They are still young, so they mostly just climb around and scamper about, but I think when they calm down a little they will happily just lay around with me on the couch.

    Surprisingly, they do not like the rat ball we got them.  The instant we put them inside, they shit and pee all over the thing.  In contrast, if we just let them run around on the floor they don’t shit at all.  I think they are frightened of the inside of the ball being so enclosed.  If we wanted them to use it, I think we would have had to never let them run around freely and only let them out of the cage to be in the ball, and I feel like that would be some kind of cruelty to animals.  I would much rather watch them run and play with one another outside the ball anyway.  Plus, only one of them can be in the ball at a time, so that leaves the other one lonely in the cage.  Maybe some animals like running around in the balls, but not our little rats.

    Anyway, we love them so much and are so glad to have them around.  Their cage is really easy to clean and they don’t eat all that much, so if you are ever looking for an absolutely great pet without all the problems of larger pets, rats are totally wonderful!

    Women and Childbirth Timeline

    We’ve come to the decision that we have to set a timeline on this whole childbirth thing, especially if we want to have like three or four kids.  I want to get started in my mid to late twenties to avoid having any children when I’m over 35.  However, we also realize that if we think finding a mutual girlfriend is hard now it will only get a zillion times more complicated with children in the picture.  Consequently, we’ve discussed it and kind of decided that when I turn 26, regardless of whatever else is going on in our lives, we’re going to start trying for children.  We hope that we find a girl before then, and we hope that I’ll complete my PhD by then, but regardless of those things children are the most important thing to both of us.  We want to have children and raise them above all else, careers and relationships and all that.  It’s what gives meaning to both of our lives, honestly.

    And I got a phone number.  More to come.

December 6, 2010

  • This is one of those entries when so much has happened recently that it’s all a huge jumble in my head.  Much of the emo/anstyness has passed since my last entry and I’m basically back to my normal (relatively) state of existing.  Let me list things for my own convenience:

    1.  We got two pet rats, Frank and Chuck, a few days before my last entry.  We became very attached to them and we’re both so glad that we have two wonderful little pets.

    2.  I got horribly sick (probably stress induced) and began contemplating deeply my decisions about the future.

    3.  I found out that it was against the terms of our lease to have pets, even though I thought I had read it was fine.  I flipped out and over a weekend, while being sick, we moved to another apartment in the university system that allowed pets.  It was probably one of the worst weekends of my life, made all the worse because it was completely my fault that we had to move.

    4.  I thought very deeply about my PhD and realized that I just didn’t see myself researching forever and wanted to be done with it as quickly as possible.  The main reason I wanted to stop researching is because I worry about my ovaries and having healthy children.  Also, this place is pretty lean for “progressive” thinkers or, in other words, women who would be interested in dating a couple.  For a while we thought about moving to California and having me transfer schools to an education program so that we could hopefully meet a girl and settle down.  However, I realized that it’s not that I want to teach high school, it’s that I thought becoming a high school teacher would take less time and thus get me out of school faster and away from research.  I really do want to teach college age students.

    5.  My parents suggested teaching at a community college.  I jumped on this and went through a lot of effort to research the feasibility of getting a faculty job at a community college.  I really liked the idea because it would mean I would only need a Masters (and thus only a few more months of school) and then I could start my “real” life.  I also realized that I didn’t want to move away from my parents because I want them to be involved in their grandchildrens’ lives more than just passingly.

    6.  I met with my professor to discuss how long it would take to get my Masters.  He explained that it would probably take another year and a half.  I was crestfallen and realized that if I had to stay that long I might as well stay and extra year and get my PhD.

    7.  I talked with some other graduate students who are of the same mindset as me (teaching before research) and found that they unanimously made the same decision as I had.  We all want to teach, but we don’t want to be limited to ONLY community college when a PhD would let us teach anywhere.  It made me feel validated in my thought process and strengthened my resolve to continue forward.

    8.  We had an apartment warming party to break in our new (and super amazing) place.  It’s so amazing that I kind of think the whole rats thing was a boon in disguise.  And the party was really fun.  Good times had by all.

    That brings us to the present day.  I’m not completely happy about continuing research, but I realize it is a necessary evil if I want to become a college teacher.  I’m really really really satisfied with the new apartment.  I’m overall happy with life again.

    I’ll go into more detail about:
    - women
    - rats
    - childbirth timeline
    later when I have more time to type.