Dept of bitching and moaning

These are things I was used to that I no longer have to deal with, so each annoyance is like a poke in the eye. I am missing the northern lights and solar eclipse for this shit.

Complaints:

30 years of telling this man about bacteria and how we do not wash smelly kitchen rags and floor-cleaning towels with our daily laundry because bacteria in our underwear is fucking gross, and yesterday he threw the wet floor towel (an old grungy beige towel I use after scrubbing/mopping the cat shit off the bathroom floor) into a load of laundry WITH MY WORK CLOTHES. And then left it wet in the washer overnight. I opened the machine up, looking for my pants, and burst into flames.

He ate all the yogurt. And the cottage cheese.

He ate the piece of chocolate I was saving.

He makes himself smoothies twice a day but doesn’t have lunch or breakfast foods for the kids.

He unplugs my devices to charge his own.

He trimmed the tree and left a huge pile of branches on the patio to dry out and be a fire hazard. Again. Right next to the wood chipper.

I’m sure he’s doing good things, too, but I can’t see it. He annoys me even when he isn’t doing anything wrong. It was fine when he visited my place, but over here I want to kick him in the face every time I look at him.

Meanwhile:

The neighbors had a huge party in our shared driveway, with tents and screaming kids and cars parked everywhere. Even when they’re not partying, the noise is constant; traffic, military planes, helicopters, blasting car stereos, roosters crowing, people yelling, balls bouncing in the street. The windows are just screens and louvres, you can’t shut the sound out, there is no escape anywhere.

It is hot and everything is damp. Dust settles and turns to black grime. I washed the crud off the louvres and scraped black clusters of cockroach egg casings out of the rails.

Broke up a fight between two library homeless guys who both wanted me to call the cops because they claimed the other one was threatening to chop their head off. 

Had to shut down my blog because I suddenly got hit with THOUSANDS of bots. Wtf, nobody needs to farm this content. There is no plot resolution here. It’s the tale of a woman who takes three decades to finally get away from her cheating husband and then comes back to visit and scrub the floor anyway. It’s a bad story. I’m rewriting the second half of it.

West Jet has a “no pets on flights out of Hawaii” policy and I can’t take Billy back with me. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to—it’s a long trip with a bad cat—but having the decision made for me makes me feel mutinous.

My anxiety is up in my neck. I want to go home. I deal with stress by cleaning and baking, and hell if I want to reward this man with a clean house and cookies. I’m doing it anyway though, because I love my kids.

Weight lost so far: 10lbs.

Back at the library

Lunch break. Day 1. (Subbing for 2 weeks to make some money and, evidently, FIX EVERYTHING.)

The air conditioning is out. It is 90 degrees in the library, we are sweating through our clothes. The new temporary branch manager is a kid in grad school who has no idea how she got into this position. The new circulation sub doesn’t know how to use the computer. Former boss came in to orient the new people for a couple hours and then skedaddled into retirement, leaving my old coworker and me to figure out what the fuck is happening with all the money report errors and mis-checked items and late fine disasters. I sorted out $600 in fines for one frantic mother whose renewals haven’t been working since I left and half her books were marked missing because they weren’t checked in correctly. There are dozens of people crammed into the hot library, trashing the children’s area, messing up the merch cabinet, asking how to print and where the toilets are, and complaining about the temperature. 

Boss told me I could still apply for the permanent manager position, and that the marketing department is hiring a graphic designer in Honolulu. There is a new regional manager, and my old friend from grad school just got the manager position at another branch. I am annoyed that all these promotions opened up right after I left, and annoyed that I am annoyed because I don’t actually want the jobs. The commute to Honolulu and parking garage fees negate the pay raise, the bureaucracy of branch management is awful, my neighbors are noisy as hell, and every bad memory still lives in the corners of my home. I miss my crows, and the quiet walks around the pond with the seals and otters and ducks. I am broke and lost my career trajectory, but the drop in status has paid for peace and a cute little house on the sea, with summers and Christmas breaks off—which I could never hope to have here. Reality feels warped, and it’s hard to believe I’ll ever be able to go back.

But it’s nice to get everything back in working order here. My poor coworker has been trying to keep the place running like someone scooping water out of a sinking canoe. 

Having a lot of mixed feelings today, ha.

(Total weight lost: 5 lbs)

Show me the way to go home

It does feel like the past 6 months were a dream, except for the jarring irregularities. The house, although obviously cleaned for my arrival, is slightly shabbier. Every small change has been a downgrade; the decorative metal toilet paper stand was replaced with a plastic 3D printed wall holder, the bed had been stripped of the memory foam topper, the side table was moved out of reach for tea cups, and the replacement lamp shade still has the plastic on it. The bathroom floor was swept, but hasn’t been scrubbed since I left.

I was happy to be back with my boy and my cats. Billy and Lili came to sit on me and make biscuits. Zenny did, too. I had been wondering if 6 months alone with me might have put her off my company for a while, but all of that teenager/parent head-butting brought us closer. She’s been laying on my lap, interlocking our fingers while watching tv, and going out with me to shop for clothes, making jokes and talking up a storm. A few times she’s dropped her voice and whispered, “I can’t wait to go home. It’s nice to visit, but everything is better there.” Same, kid. “Except the food.” Yeah. We’ll be packing a lot of ingredients back with us.

Mike slept on the trundle bed in the boys’ room, and I climbed onto the rickety bed. It wasn’t rickety when I left, but now it feels like the middle support will give out at any moment and dump the bed onto the floor. I laid on the hard mattress and tried not to think about what he might have been doing to ruin the memory foam and loosen the bed frame. I slept at my mother’s house for the next few nights. Zenny came with me.

I’ve been happy to spend time with Leif, and to hear him play piano again. The food is good. We’re all going to see the new Spider-Man movie this weekend. The wild chickens make me happy, and the mountains are beautiful. I’m sweaty and greasy from the sudden immersion into the heat and humidity, but my wrinkles are smoothing out like steam ironing, so that’s ok.

I’ve been less happy to check the kettle and my tea cups for cockroaches every morning, and to shake the toaster for geckos (I love the geckos, I don’t want them toasted). The homeless encampment near our house is bigger. People in the stores will run over you if you don’t jump out of the way, and give you dirty looks when they hit you. Parents tell their kids to shut the fuck up or they’ll kick their fucking asses. Pit bulls in every yard. Screaming neighbors. Traffic jams, cars parked everywhere, abandoned vehicles. 

I’ve lost 3lbs this week, though, so that’s something anyway.

Starting back at the library next week.

Out the door

I filled the bird feeders, shut off the breaker to the hot water heater, unplugged everything, said goodbye to the crows, locked up, and hopped the coach to St. John’s. We stopped about a half hour out of Goobies to check on a mail driver who had hit a moose and smashed in the entire front of the van. He was ok, somehow, and waiting for police to make the hours-long drive out to meet him. We had to leave him there alone with the dead moose.

Dropped off at the airport, I had about 8 hours to kill. I live here now, sitting in the terminal watching people come and go, eating protein bars and Diet Coke. I don’t feel anything. My suitcase was a matryoshka of other suitcases, with one pair of jeans and three tank tops in the middle. Almost everything I own is still in Hawaii, I’m just returning the bags so Leif can move to Scotland.

If this imaginary plane ever boards, it’s 6 hours to the west coast, then 12 hours overnight at the airport, sleeping on chairs because I felt broke and cancelled my hotel reservation. 1 hour to another west coast airport; 5 hours sleeping on different chairs. 6 hours to Hawaii. I’ll get in tomorrow night, wrecked. 

I brought my knitting and sketchbook and downloaded books to listen to, but I’ve just been sitting and staring. Travel exists in its own time, there’s no point trying to get out of it.

Notes from the liminal place:

The seating has shrunk again, and my knees now press the seats in front of me. The men on either side of me were spreading their legs as far apart as they could go, but not because they were assholes. Their femurs just wouldn’t fit any other way. They were tense the whole flight, trying not to tap me with their knees and elbows. I folded like a pocket knife and stayed still for 6 hours to help out.

At the midnight airport, I roamed around the terminals looking for a place to sleep. In a long deserted corridor lined with unused security carts, I found an unoccupied area filled with jumbled lounge chairs and long padded benches. There were rows of airport wheelchairs parked at the back, cordoned off in a dark area. Nobody was sitting there, but there were no signs to warn me off, so I went to the back of the room and laid down on a long cushioned bench. When I opened my eyes at 1:30am, two other women were sleeping on the benches around me. By 4:30am there were six women asleep under sweatshirts and airplane blankets. 10,000 years of instincts kept us all puddled together so we could sleep safely. People are cute.

I have a cup of tea, a breakfast sandwich, and 5 more hours before my next flight. I still don’t feel anything about this trip. 

A million hours later

Flew to Vancouver surrounded by kids coming back from summer camp with desperate young counselors who couldn’t figure out why all the kids on the list said “here” and raised their hand when called, but their head count was short by one. The cabin crew did not give a shit if they left a kid behind, they were shutting the doors on time and that was the camp’s problem. There was brief PANIC as the doors closed, but thankfully it was just a problem with the list and nobody was actually missing.

Last layover. My brain is failing. I need a shower. Lost my AirPods in International security, didn’t realize it until I had gone through customs and sat down to eat a $20 sandwich. Backtracked. Jumped up and down waving like an idiot outside the DO NOT ENTER doors at customs. Came in when the airport police officer waved me through to the customs agent, then walked in literal circles when she told me to go back where I came from first. Back to the customs line? Nobody was even in the line, so I stood at the entrance to it. “No, all the way back.” Wtf, ok, I walked all the way to the start of the empty line and walked through the maze to stand back in front of her again, confused. “NO, BACK TO SECURITY, ALL THE WAY DOWN THERE IN THE NEXT ROOM.” I slapped my forehead.

I have my AirPods, and bought a bottle of Wayne Gretzky maple cream bourbon in the Duty Free shop just because I thought it was funny.

10 more hours to go. They’ll have to scrape me out of my seat and pour me into baggage claim when we get there.

The last leg 

I laid down across some empty seats at the gate and napped on my cat-shaped pillow. I felt greasy and unwashed and old and fat, but when I cracked my eyes open there was a good-looking dad in his 40s looking at me like I was the Madonna of the Trash Heap. I checked to make sure a tit hadn’t fallen out of my tank top or something, but he kept throwing me sneaky glances like a teenager, smiling when I accidentally made eye contact, and suddenly I felt dewy-faced and tousle-haired and not-so-old and voluptuous. This was kind of annoying, actually, because it was absolutely unacceptable behavior from a married man with kids on his lap and a wife trying to engage him with travel logistics, but still - visible to someone age-appropriate and conventionally attractive? Maybe it’s not too late for a hoe-phase after all. This is not that day, though. Mind your family, horny man on vacation. 

When we finally boarded the plane to Hawaii, I was glad not to be seated near the family. I tried not to fall asleep, because it’ll be 9pm when we land and I still need to sleep the night, but I failed, and three hours blipped by. We’re making the descent now, and I’m starting to feel something. It feels like… I am going home after any other trip I’ve ever been on, and the past 6 months were a fever dream that wasn’t actually real.

… and a swelling rage.

Take two

I am going back over to the neighbors’ house for supper, this time with a chocolate haupia pie and a self defense bottle of diet ginger ale to ward off mixed drinks.

Hold me in your thoughts.

Will report back.

Edited to update:

Not drunk! And I didn’t say anything stupid or embarrassing. I don’t even think I could—the neighbors tell way more dick jokes and gross stories than I do.

I trotted down the hill with my pie and was met by laughing people and a Bud Light. I nursed the beer and drank my ginger ale, listening to the family share drunken misadventure stories. 

“Jaysus, and he was that drunk, we had to hold him up under both arms to get him to the car, and we’re dragging him along like that and he says ‘ah, hang on, hold my pecker, will yous? I has to pee!’ B’y, you’d better not drink all that, I’m not holding your pecker again!”  

“And they went out poaching, caught a moose, got it out back where they could dress it in the shed without getting caught, and suddenly their friends come popping in and asking, ‘You gots some moose, wha’?’ And they’re like, fucking hell, how did those guys know we had a moose? They says, ‘We just followed the trail of blood from your truck!’” 

I asked, “How did they know they had a moose in there and not a person?” “Oh, nobody would ever notice if you had a person. My friend worked for the funeral home and needed help moving a few bodies, but she didn’t have a hearse, so I was driving all over the peninsula with two dead bodies in the back of an SUV, and nobody pulled me over.” 

We all crowded into the kitchen to load plates with salt beef, cabbage, turkey, and turnips. The pie was demolished. I drank my soda and listened to stories, we laughed at the little dog getting harassed by the crows, and I took an early leave to head home when the sun started going down. These kind of parties might be more drinking and cigarette smoke than I can handle for very long—I’m more of a snacks and card games kind of socializer—but it was nice to be around people.

One more day before I go back. 

Newfies

  I went to the neighbor’s to give them my phone number in case my house combusts while I’m gone and now I’m drunk. And I have agreed to go over for jigs dinner on Thursday with their family oh no

“That’s Saint Pierre vodka and now you’re complicit in the smuggling trade” lol

Edited to add: in the spirit of honesty/stupidity, I am adding this post back after deleting it for breaking my “don’t drink and type” rule. At least I didn’t email any regrettable memes or declarations of love.

I am going to bring a bottle of ginger ale to supper tomorrow and wave it at people when they try to hand me more cocktails. No wonder you have to smuggle in the booze from Saint Pierre, holy shit, my poor head.

Hiking for the very dim

As I was hauling myself up a rope along a vertical muddy path covered in fresh moose poop, it occurred to me that I should have told someone where I was going before I headed out on a hike by myself. The Walk of Hope trail next to the 20 foot statue of the kaiju Virgin Mary had seemed like a nice safe little old lady path, for no other reason than its cute name and obvious churchiness. I forgot about Catholicism. Catholics go hard with suffering. This was the Walk of Hope-you-ever-find-civilization-again trail. The Walk of Hope-a-moose-doesn’t-kill-you-before-you-find-your-car trail. And don’t we have bears? I’m pretty sure we have bears. 

One of the side trails led to a large pond covered in lily pads, and the water rippled and plunked and honked in alarm as I got to the landing. After a quiet moment, dozens of little frog faces rose out of the water, meeping at one another. More frogs swam under the surface of the water, some kicking long legs and some swishing late tadpole tails. Dragonflies landed on my arms as I leaned on the railing. It was absolutely charming.

I finally made it back to my car, and looked at the bin of walking sticks at the entrance to the trail. I am learning that this is a sign: if there are walking sticks to borrow, you are in trouble.

The day before, I decided to walk up to Cook’s Lookout, and ignored the walking sticks hung on pegs by the entrance sign. I’d seen the photos online, and there were wooden walkways and stairs all the way to the top of the hill. I did not see the parts you had to climb to get to and from the stairs. Or appreciate how those stairs kept going up for a mile, always looking like the top was just a few staircases up, only to find yourself looking at them dipping down into a valley before going straight up again. Jeans, I cursed myself. You wore jeans and a cardigan on a goddamn mountain hike.

I had learned my lesson and wore yoga pants for the second hike, but I was still too dumb to choose ones with pockets, so my phone was tucked into my waistband and accidentally taking a 20-minute video of me crunching along rocks, breathing like a Clydesdale, and singing like a muppet until I remembered about the bears and shut up. 

For today’s adventure, maybe I’ll just go down to Smuggler’s Cove and eat chicken wings while the band plays.

Foggy morning drive down to the bay near my house:

hike to Cook's Lookout:

"this is easy" 

FIRST SET OF STAIRS

One of the things I love about Newfoundland are the ponds absolutely everywhere, at any elevation, with no waterfalls leading from one to another, just sitting anywhere they like with no regard to sea level or gravity

see?

 

very wow, with the fog in the distance

 

the endangered carnivorous Newfoundland pitcher plant, 

growing everywhere like tulips in the Netherlands up here on Cook's Lookout

 

RIP whoever this is who didn't want to walk all the way back down those stairs 

 

Walk of Hope:

 

see that rope in the corner? It goes STRAIGHT DOWN. 

...Where is my car? 

 

moose poopies 

 

FROG 

 

MORE FROG 

 

imagine little burping noises in all directions 

 

borp borp borp borp 

 

path that led to rope and mooses 

there were flowers and blueberries everywhere (not ripe yet, but I will be back) 

Misc:

 

painted dining room blue 

 getting mad at flowers again

 

Not pictured: the night I decided to have a beer, accidentally bought an IPA, poisoned myself (one can), and was up sick all night. I don't know what kind of hops they use for those, but my body rejects it wholeheartedly. 

 

Also I finally got my broken tooth fixed, and found out my dental insurance was cut off for summer, so it cost $500. Goddamn. Still cheaper than if I had gotten it done back in Hawaii on insurance.

 

I'm having a really nice time, teeth and hops notwithstanding. Worrying about going back in a week.

Unsupervised

I worried a bit that I might actually be lonely, once I was faced with a dark night in a quiet house, but I am a house cat of a human being. To mark my territory, I washed all the bedding to get rid of the smells of other humans, hung them out in the sun to dry, remade all the beds, and tidied the rooms so they looked the way I liked. I bought groceries just for me - lox, capers, tomatoes, light nut milk, salad greens, sugar-free creamer - and planned my meals for the day with my calorie-tracker app. 

When you finally have time to do things, you want to do everything all at once, and I finally settled on a routine: writing for an hour every morning*, painting until lunch while the light is good, chores and projects until dinner, and drawing/planning for the next day in the evening while watching a tv show. I go to bed happy and sore, have bad dreams about going back home, and wake up glad to be alone in my own bed. I don't suppose the dreams will get any better, the closer to going back I get, but at least I don't have to think about that during the day.

On Wednesday, I painted the living room a color I like. Yesterday, I used the old bucket of stain in the pantry to re-paint the porch. I have one more regular payday left before I go on half-pay, and I'll put a bit aside to paint the dining room and hallway, and maybe the kitchen, since I'm saving on gas and grocery money right now. The coordinating paint chips are all laid out and labeled on the table, ready to go while nobody is around to talk me into more sensible colors. 

 

shut up, I love it, I'll change the curtains later

 

 Next year I'll paint the porch a Jelly Bean Row kind of color, but this is what I had, and at least it's ready for winter now.

 

I'm painting flowers, and primed some small boards for little landscape studies. I've got lino-cut panels to carve, once I've drawn a design. It feels like summer break as a kid, I'm excited for each day, and each part of the day. I miss my kids, and I look forward to seeing my cats, but this is the most I've felt like myself in ages. 

 

*A couple years ago I started writing a book, and it was flying out of my fingers for months before my flash drive was stolen by a library hobo. I haven't been able to get started on it again, because I know I can't rewrite everything the way it was, and so many of the plot details are lost to me now. I did a lot of research before starting the first draft, and all of that went with the flash drive. Instead of re-researching all of it, I put on a Ken Follet audio book (World Without End), because that is a man who will read you every bit of research he's ever done, with a good story to go with it. And it's 45 fucking hours long, so I can paint in the mornings and learn about medieval feudal systems and church hierarchy for the next week and a half. I've only written a couple pages so far, but I'm hoping the block will crack if I keep hammering at it.

DIY, weenie roasts, and beer

 

 

Everything went okay. I kissed the girl goodbye, waved her and Mike off at the airport, went out for Chinese buffet with Laurie, lost my ability to meal plan in Costco (what can I make with Activia, creamed honey, canned chicken, blueberries, and bubbly water?), and drove home listening to The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. I am too tired to think, but happy to have 17 days to get myself into trouble, going out to find places to paint and listen to live music. 

Bullet point summary, because narration is hard after 6 hours of driving.

 

*Picked Mike up at midnight on the 30th, crashed at (2-bed) airbnb. I slept on the couch. 

*The next day was Canada Day, and all the stores and restaurants were closed (except for Tim's). Visited Signal Hill, stopped by my childhood home, and had concession-stand poutine at Bowring Park with the ducks before driving home.

 *First item on to-do list: fix the giant rotting hole in the roof of the tool shed and re-shingle it. Mike bought the supplies and a circular saw, because he's just nice like that. 

*Went down to neighbor's house to borrow a ladder; came back with a ladder, two lobsters, and invitations to come over for drinks, because my neighbors are just nice like that

*Wrapped my burn barrel in steel chicken wire and made a little spark-guard hat for it, tackled the burn pile (fallen tree that has been chopped up in the yard all year), and spent every warm evening drinking Quidi Vidi beer, roasting sausages, making s'mores, and playing cards with Zenny. 

*Fixed the broken electrical outlets in the living room and installed lights in the pantry and shed.

*Installed baseboards in the studio.

*Went to the dump with the gross old baseboards and roof shingles. Stabbed myself with a rusty nail. Preeeetty sure I've had a tetanus shot in the past 7 years...? We will find out, I guess.

*Watched the entire season of Widow's Bay in 4 days. (SO good.) 

*Went to Smuggler's Cove, ate bbq, played with the guillotine, and saw their mascot: a floating structure made of elk and moose skulls. (The place was founded by bikers.) 

*Went for an early morning walk along the seashore, saw a fat sunbathing seal, got screamed at by crows, slipped and fell all over the slimy rocks and hurt ourselves because we are old. 

*Rotated my tires, because the car was shimmying slightly.

*The shimmy stopped, but Mike forgot to tighten the nuts, so one of the wheels suddenly tried to fly off while we were halfway to Goobies this morning. Pulled over in time.

*While Mike was tightening the nuts on the side of the road, I spotted an old infant car seat laying face-down in some bushes and crawled/slid/fell down a gravel slope to kick it over and make sure there wasn't a tiny skeleton strapped into it. (There was not, just a plastic grocery bag full of broken beer bottles.) Army-crawled back up to the car. 

*Airport, chinese food, Costco, etc. So tired.

 

It was a really fun visit, actually, and we got so much done in just a week - and that right there is how this man gets me every time. When he's around, the nice times blur the bad times, and makes them feel like maybe they didn't happen, or maybe I was wrong about them - but NOT THIS TIME. This is why I left the country; he can't hang around for too long, and I can't just change my mind because it's hard sometimes. My brain shut down the feelings factory, there was zero romance in the air. It was a nice friendly week, Zenny was happy to watch all the repairs going on and eat good food and play games with her dad, and I had no problem kicking the man to the curb at the airport, giving him a bro-hug, and saying BYE. 

So that is done, I can relax again, and it is time to be my own creature for a little while.

 Pictures:

 

 

 

While I was loading those pictures, my boss back in Hawaii texted to say he's retiring, and asked if I wanted his job. DAMN it. I did want it. He had been talking about retiring for years, and that was always the plan. If I had that promotion 6 months ago, I could have kept my house. I could have been with my son for his last few months of high school. I could still have my 20-year career, retirement plan, cats, publisher, gallery shows. 

But I'd still be there, and still wouldn't have been able to make Mike leave, and still be miserable. This loss of income has paid for peace and safety. I feel like I fit in somewhere for the first time since we left when I was a kid. I'm not going back. 

But I am having feelings about it. And it was nice of him to check with me.

 

Goddamn. I am going to bed. 

My brain tries to pair me like Bluetooth and is defeated by dentures

Some time last week my phone buzzed: it was a ‘hey girl’ text from an ex. I have exactly one ex who would send a jolt through me if I heard from him again, and one ex who I’d be happy to catch up and talk some shit with, and this was neither of those people. Another buzz: he sent a picture of himself with a wizard beard. No thanks. I left him on read and closed my phone.

A day later I got an email from Mike. He only sends emails when he wants to talk about his feelings in long-form and express remorse without actually promising to be better. I sent him a ‘sucks to be you’ kind of reply and closed my phone. 

(Note to both, in case they’re reading: get off my blog.)

(Note to the other two, in case of same: hey, girl)

My brain decided this was the time to activate crush mode, and one of my coworkers suddenly started looking less like a potato when he came around the library to chat. My algorithm—which tech bros insist does not actually listen to you when you’re speaking—ran commentary throughout the week. One day we talked about goats, and Instagram started giving me goat videos. The next day we talked about the hike to the puffin colony, and my feed filled with puffins and hiking. The day after that we joked about rural dentistry, and that is when my dude unexpectedly TOOK OUT HIS TEETH. The algorithm said girl, have you tried dating younger men? 

Hard pass. Absolutely not.

GTFO ALGORITHM 

So this is not shaping up to be a Heated Rivalry situation. It was enough to get me back on my diet, at least, before the teeth came out. (It was funny, I still like him, but he’s back to being friend-shaped. Probably a deliberate move on his part to brake-check me.)

Last day of work. Tomorrow we drive up to St. John’s to pick up Mike. My mental walls are going up, and I have a week-long home repair list to keep him busy. It’ll be fine. When he takes the kid back home for the summer, I will suddenly find myself with nearly 3 weeks all on my own, which I realized has never happened before in my entire life; I went from living at home, to having a roommate, to marriage and babies. The longest I’ve been on my own was 2 years ago, when the family went to Japan for a week. It was a really good week, even though a tree fell on the house and I discovered a feral cat living in my studio, which I tried to catch with a motion-activated camera and set off a chain of events that ultimately led to me quitting my job and leaving the country in the middle of the night on the day after Christmas…

…Actually, you know what, I’ll text the ladies from work and see about hanging out with them from time to time.