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December 2010

Indian food and the next phase

Last week, I went to a great Indian place I’d never visited before and thought about telling Mark we should go there sometime for lunch. Then I realized there wasn’t much point since we won’t really be going to lunch anymore after next week. That was kind of a melodramatic moment. Now that he’s posted about the specifics, I figure I owe some of my longtime readers and friends a little explanation as to what’s going on here. I’ll make it quick and snappy:

  • Yes, Mark and I will no longer be living together after the first of the year. He will be moving back to San Francisco. I will be staying put in the Triad. Unlike before, there is no specific timeline for when we might be living together in the future.
  • No, we are not calling it quits, no matter how much it may sound like it. I love my boy very much (and I know it’s mutual) but we’re adjusting to the fact that our relationship will look rather different in the future than it has for the past nine years–in many ways.
  • Yes, I want Mark to be happy. He’s not happy now, which is making us both unhappy. So we’re giving this bi-coastal thing another shot in the absence of other mutually acceptable options. Hopefully, this option will work. I realize that doing nothing will definitely not work.
  • No, I will probably not be discussing this further in this space (1) because this part of my life is personal and not for public consumption, (2) because I want to avoid oversimplifications like this one, (3) because I want to avoid any temptation to communicate by website rather than “face to face”, and (4) because it’s just not what I want to be writing about here.

So that’s where we are. Please join me in wishing Mark well in San Francisco. And don’t worry too much about me either. I’m not in a very happy place right now (big understatement there), but I’ve proven over the years to be nothing if not resilient.  I’ve got a job I love and lots of new toys to occupy my mind until we have our first rendezvous in Minneapolis or Omaha or wherever. And I’m really trying to see the positives in all this, albeit with mixed success in certain Indian restaurants.

It only hurts when I move

I fell down the stairs.

I was going down to that basement to put some laundry into the dryer. I slipped. I slid. I landed on my back. I made horrible noises that scared Mark a lot. My teeth chattered and I started shivering. Mark mentioned internal bleeding and I remembered the blood thinners and how I’m supposed to be paranoid about impacts like these. So we went to the emergency room. It was probably an overreaction, but at least they gave me pain pills.

Funny, it all started because I was washing some dressier than usual duds for work today since one of the search committees I’m on had an on-campus interview scheduled. And as it turned out, I didn’t go to work at all, although I did show up for part of the interview–in virtual form. Serves me right for thinking about wearing a dress shirt to work, dammit.

Anyway, I’m gonna take another nap now.

Oh, and they printed my letter to the Winston-Salem Daily Pamphlet yesterday. Not my best work ever, but it suffices as my farewell to the paper.

Ice, ice, baby

There’s a little ice storm this morning, which means, as usual, that I have to hear lots of highway workers and state troopers with heavy southern accents saying “treacherous” and”solid sheet of ice” over and over again on TV. A little variation in terminology would be nice once in a while.

The perils of cross-country travel

It’s inevitable. You always end up leaving something in the hotel room. Usually it’s something of no real value, but sometimes it’s something vitally important, maybe even something you love. And all you can do is hope they keep it safe and happy until you eventually get it back.