Writing Update

I am at a good stopping point with the novel (perhaps break is a better term). So I feel less superstitious telling you about my progress. Since we got to Dallas at the beginning of July and settled in, I've been writing almost every day. I've written 176 pages since we've been here. The novel is currently divided into four sections or "acts" and now I have a draft of the first three. I'm going to Vermont tomorrow and after the conference, I'm hoping to finish a draft of the final section. That's what my summer's been like: a lot of writing, not much reading, very little web surfing. After the conference, my job search will kick into a higher gear. I'm hoping I'll be able to get the final section of the novel done before I start working. Then the revision will begin.

Nate and I were both a little worried that we might not be able to handle the Texas heat after Chicago. But the summer weather has been temperate, until recently. Even the heat isn't so bad. But the mosquitos are horrible. I had forgotten all about them! Hopefully the skeeters won't be too bad in VT.

Personal Lexicon

"You're an Onarga."

"You're an Onarga Oneida."

"At least I'm not a Pupusa head."

On our relocation drive down to Dallas from Chicago, Nate and I noticed unusual names. Onarga, Oneida, and Pupusa were all cities, exits, or restaurants we saw along the way through Illinois, Kentucky, Arkansas, or Texas. Those words are now part of our permanent vocabulary, especially when we're calling each other names.

We also have a couple of stories we picked up on our travels. Back in November 2001, Nate took a flight to Austin to help me drive a U-haul for my move to Chicago (he had moved to Illinois six months before I did). Near Rolla, Missouri, we had a fuel stop. We both went into the station/store to get drinks and pay for the gas. There was a fairly long line, and the woman at the front was exasperated with her husband, who was still picking something out.

"Hurry up," she said. "There are all these people waiting on you."

"Woman, I'm checking the damn expiration dates on the Dr. Pepper."

Needless to say, we started giggling. We were a little giddy. We had been driving for hours, the guy made his pronoucement in a great Southern drawl, and we didn't even know Dr. Pepper had expiration dates. The rest of the trip, whenever I made a request, Nate would turn to me and say, "Woman," in that same tone of self-righteous exasperation. He still says it from time to time.

On our recent return drive to Texas, we were just outside of Little Rock, Arkansas, when we stopped at a McDonald's. We were hoping to order breakfast. They stopped serving breakfast at 10. It was 10:02. We stared at the menu, trying to pick the most innocuous food, neither of us wanting anything fried so early in the morning. There was a crew of giggly teenagers working behind the counter. We walked up to one of them.

"I'd like to order--" I started.

"My ankle just popped," the guy behind the counter interrupted.

Nate and I looked at each other. I didn't know how to respond.

"Are you OK?" Nate asked.

"Yeah. I'm OK. My ankle just popped."

We ordered our food and went on our merry way.

Are these incidents and words actually funny? Or is it just the circumstances we found them in--tired, bored, and suffering cabin fever after a cross-country drive? I'm not sure. But what that teenager didn't know was that "my ankle just popped" entered our lexicon forever.

Another Update
 
I'm not sure how much I'll update this summer. (I know that's a shocker; I barely update as it is.) I have a decent reason, however. I don't have an Internet connection on my laptop. Nate is using the router for his work and home computers. We could rig it up so that I could have a connection, but I don't really want it. I'm getting a lot done this summer and I know it's because I don't have the siren song of the Internet calling out to me. I can waste hours on that damn thing, still, after years of working online.
 
So what am I doing? I don't want to go into too much detail because the last time I kept track of my writing progress on the site, I didn't write for two or three months. Life got very crazy, it's true, but I'm a superstitious person by nature. I'm getting a lot done, let's just leave it at that. Much more than I had dared to hope.
 
In other news, I applied for two jobs today. Jobs I'm actually interested in. I also got turned down for unemployment. Some states offer unemployment benefits if you leave your job because of your spouse's relocation, but not all of them. So far, it doesn't appear that Illinois is one of those states. The denial letter said something along the lines of the employer not having any control over my spouse's relocation. Well, duh. Neither did I, which is why I had to quit. I suppose I could have exerted my wifely will over my husband's decision, but the job seemed like a good deal, so here we are. I'm appealing the decision, but if I don't get any benefits, well, I don't get them. I'm still having a good summer.
 
I suppose I can afford to be a little blasé about not having any money or a job because luckily, my husband has both. And we have the good fortune of living in a great house for a few months rent free (all we have to pay are utilities), courtesy of Nate's very generous Aunt Jay. So I'm still in the applying-for-jobs-I-would-like-to-have phase. We are not yet in the must-eat-must-have-paycheck round of job searching.
 
Speaking of the house, you should check out Nate's site. He has a pretty nifty gallery of our new digs.

Big D

We have been in Dallas for two weeks. So far, so good. We are staying in Nate's aunt's house for three months while we scope out the city and figure out where we want to live. The house is big and comfortable. Plenty of room for all of us. My office is in the front bedroom and Nate has the middle room for his office/cave. Nate's working from home now so that's a big adjusment.

Dallas is an easy city to live in. Not too crowded, not too much traffic except during rush hours. It is also a big adjustment. Our neighborhood is very quiet. Our neighbor across the street has something like five cars in his driveway and in front of his house. I've seen one car move regularly. Our lives are so quiet now that when I saw two cars gone, I had to tell Nate. The mail man is a major event. In Nate's office, he watches two lizards run across his windows.

But things are going very well. Just a slower pace. We're both getting a lot of work done and seeing our families more, which was one of the main reasons to move back to Texas. We've been eating a lot of Mexican food and Bar-B-Que, two other reasons to come back. Also, can you say queso? I love that stuff. All we could get in Chicago was queso fundido, which is good but not quite the same. Ahhh, queso. And margaritas. I'm glad to be back.

P.S. Those tenants did work out. No worries, except for that whole not having a job thing. Not too worried about it though. Not yet.