College Town

Tuesday was the first day of school for the 2005-06 academic year.

It's also coming up on the 1-year anniversary since I left my job. And I don't think I ever made it official in these posts that I worked at a university. There, now I have. And, yes, I've gone from full-time university employee to full-time student in the past year.

Not really sure if I have a point to this post, just reflecting on the thought that Tuesday was the first "first day of school" I've missed at the university since 1990.

And that feels pretty damn strange right now. I was in high school in 1990.

I have time to reflect because I'm taking care of the kids right now. My wife's at work and while I'd like to be downstairs hard at work on my final projects (my semester ends September 15th), I'm taking care of the children. So, they're fully distracted by toys & cartoons (God bless Saturday mornings), and I have time to surf the 'Net a bit more than I should be able to right now.

So, to the "fans" I know are reading this:
Mad, I get the feeling your blog has become an intimate part of your life. You're sharing, venting, and healing all at once. I think I've learned more about you in the past month or so of posts than I have through your lists of 100 things...
Jules, good to hear from you again. Miss your blog, but it's somewhat totally understandable why you stopped.
Dreama, congrats on the job! Don't know if you've posted it yet on your own blog, but I saw your IM byline. And, no, I wasn't still up at 5am when you sent that note. I had long since gone to sleep (around 3:30...)

Oh, and one more thing. The coffee embargo stopped today. 36 days without a drop. I've been up since 8:30 and I'm on my 3rd cup and getting up now for my 4th.

And now I'm onto #4.

On September 22nd I have a lunch date with Bean, one of my first friends from working at the university. She & I worked together from August 1997 - June 2002. I had a couple of stops along the way, but somehow continued to work in the same department with her at the same time. She's moving north in October and I have to admit I'm still shocked to see her go. I thought she'd be there 'til the day she died (and knowing that place, it could be soon). Actually, she'd acknowledge that too and that's probably one of the reasons she's going. She was smart enough to request a 1-year leave of absence, "just in case," but most people don't come back after that year. I know one person who did and she lasted 6 weeks before she told everyone in her department to burn in Hell. And she was the director!

Bean was the one who owned a horse who shared my name. She's also the one who started the whole womanizer title for me. She'd talk about having sore thighs from "riding [the horse] all night" and a few people never clued in she wasn't referring to me. She stopped even trying to explain that it was actually a horse because people assumed she referred to me as the horse.

My horse noises in the hallways weren't helping with that either.

Ah, the good memories. Thet seem few and far between with the bad ones, but I'm starting to block those out on purpose. I might explain in a later post just where each co-worker (from Hell and not from Hell) fit in to my old university life.

Just not quite yet.