a letter to a friend

S----, I am working in a library now, a high school one, here in Etown. It is huge, larger than all the schools I have attended in my life combined. Student enrollment is around 3,200, so we have two libraries, one for fiction and the reference library. I work in the reference library, mainly in charge of periodicals, but basically I do lots of other random things as well. I am by far the youngest person in the department, probably by around 12 years, but I also work with really good people, so that helps. As for how I finagled it, I was lucky enough to find out about the job through J's mom Sh who works here as well. Then I guess I just appealed to them. I think being a recent graduate helped, but I really don't know why it was that they hired me. The library itself is really beautiful, I mean especially if you find books beautiful. But the main room is two stories high, with books lining every wall. There is also a balcony, or a narrow walkway on three walls of the room. The fourth wall of the room is a huge bank of windows, with these long rust colored drapes on it. On mornings like today when the sun shines directly in, some of the blinds are closed, but still sunlight comes pouring through. Making all the computer screens hard to see. My little desk is in the entrance way between the main room and the reference room. I have my own phone, although I have yet to figure out how to set up my voice mail. And my own computer, which I use for such wasteful purposes as emailing and interneting, although I try very hard to limit it to before work or during lunch. I am still learning things here at work, trying to figure out my place in the department and learning various library tasks. It is funny that I have already been here a month, only 9 more of those left in this year. My favorite of the random tasks I have taken on, was stamping all the new fiction books in this years "July" order. Basically this gave me an excuse to look at all the new books and call first dibs on them. So far I am reading both Freakanomics and The Book Thief. Fall is definitely arriving here in Etown, the leaves are beginning to change, and the weather is moving from crisp mornings to just a little chilly. But this morning the sky was brilliantly blue, with just a few puffs of clouds. How is C---- treating you? Are you feeling more settled in? Have you tried the baozi yet? What kind of classes are you teaching? Anways I am due to actually start working soon, but I too would love to know what you are up too and I apologize for my lateness of emailing. I feel like in all this transitioning I haven't had time or energy for much more than unpacking and sleeping. But I think things are getting better. take care, Abby

I hate titles

not really, but today has definitely been one of those crazy up and down days that occurs shall we say usually once a month. Most of the day was really good, work went well. I felt productive and useful, two things that I have found are very important in the success of my days at the Job. I feel like I need to have instant blogging access or none at all. Today I thought about blogging about living in a city, which I really like so far. However then after a babysitting job, I had to be driven home the 10 minutes or so, because it was dark and I am a woman. But today as I was walking around there were so many beautiful moments, trees in the wind, old buildings, sounds of children laughing through apartment windows above my heads. It is a little crazy how quickly life of going to bed at 10pm (unlike tonight where I am being very stupid) and getting up at 6:30am have become routine. While on occasion I look back on the flexibility of class schedules with mild nostalgia, for the most part this new life has becomes strangely normal. It is interesting how despite the level of adult things I am doing now, I remain unconvinced that this really is my new life. In other news, the kitty is probably 50% less pissy, maybe its the lack of men around, or the smaller place, who knows.

quest of bohemia

Becca and I have decided upon a theme for our room and it is earthtone bohemian. Today we picked out curtains at Target, they are an olive green and then over that a gauzy ribbon like curtain with the earthtones. I love them, and they should hopefully be up tonight, because J's dad (handy man extrodenaire) has promised to come over and help. Although I should have you know Becca and I would have been fine putting them up ourselves, but as I learned after stripping out two screw heads, they required pre-drilled holes and our lovely apartment doesn't have a drill. Once everything is set, maybe I will post some pictures here, however this may be difficult seeing as my digital camera is still in repair somewhere between here and Gtown. Today we checked out R--- Place again, it is a lovely welcoming church. I like it that has young people, old people, physically challenged, able bodied, black, white people all worshiping together. However it will be hard for me to be satisfied at any church after AMC. R--- also mainly uses praise and worship songs in their worship, which I am learning to appreciate more. However in general I get less out of them then hymns.

update

I keep thinking of slightly witty and interesting things to blog, but unfortunately this mainly happens while I am at work, so I of course don't have time to actually write about them. And I am sure not gonna do that whole blogging from work thing. No way, man! But yes, as you may assume from this little post, we do officially have wireless here in our apartment. I set it up this evening after the girls and I watched another Firefly episode. I have to just say, I love Mal and I would definitely have his children in a heartbeat. In other news from the day. We had the most amazing supper, Becca had her day off so she baked bread and pumpkin pecan pie with homemade cinnamon whipped cream, and yes it was as good as it sounds. Oh and the spaghetti was great too. Cel---- was over to check out our extra bookcase and chair and so she stayed to have dinner with us. We had a really good conversations ranging from feminism, jouranlism to homosexuality and Christianity. Oh and I opened one of my bottles of Cherry wine that I bought at Tabor Hill. It is a very lovely wine, but it much better served alone or as a dessert, it didn't really compliment the acidity of the tomatoes. So yes that brings up to the moment where I am sitting here on our free but bugger of a couch to move up a small back stairs, bumming around on the internet way past my bedtime, just because I can.

and now for a brief update

So in the past week I: served as a bridesmaid in T & C's wedding (which was beautiful) loaded up a moving truck with all my belongings changed my location to Etown signed a lease received my first two salaried pay checks opened a new bank account signed up for electricity and phone service painted 4 rooms in our new apartment drove from G to Etown with a plant, 2 lamps, some boxes and a pissed off kitty unpacked a kitchen put together a pair of bunk beds and most recently walked to our local coffee shop with free wireless and ordered a small chai and pumpkin bread becoming a responsible certified adult presence = priceless

ah chai with good froth

Froth is a key ingredient in any steamed hot drink. Obviously the cappuccino owes pretty much its entire existence to it, and despite how latte's have it removed, is a natural by-product of the steaming process. Ranging from the crazy thick stuff made by half n half to the really light and airy skim version, by far my favorite is chai foam. Back at GG when I worked with B----, we invented the Cup O' Foam. Pretty much self-explanatory, this mainly consisted of layers of different kinds of foam. And seriously it was actually a really good drink! Foam is also important in a drink because it seems to keep the drink warmer longer. Now for all I know this could have absolutely no scientific backing, but seriously the stuff is like a little whipped blanket. So I encourage you all to go out and order something with extra foam (preferably something from a locally owned coffee shop).

I don't feel like posting

but I still have cool friends

Job tidbit

When I check magazines I get to stamp them with a special stamp with our address on it. And because it is blue, I have to stamp it on the light parts of the magazine. So today I stamped the foreheads of: Kirsten Dunst Hillary Clinton Carrie Underwood Beyonce A rich man who was on the cover of Wired and most importantly the Milky Way Galaxy Good day, eh!