Currently taking up space in my head:

Continuing organizational changes. My boss is leaving. I haven’t said anything on here because it’s her news, not mine, and I know there are some worklurkers reading from time to time (hi, guys!). But enough people have heard about it and started asking me about it that I can say…this is on my mind. For the foreseeable future, I’m back to reporting to my VP, which I’ve done before, and there is no immediate plan to rehire a publications director. One of the greatest benefits and challenges of my job, though, is that things are always in flux, so I’m curious to see how this change plays out.

A homework plan and set-up. The ClassThatBlows is turning out to be the fun one, if only because the instructor talks more about the class topic–how and why to do research a certain way–than about her Twitter feed. However, I can see myself spending a good 15 hours a week on the reading assignments, not to mention I TOTALLY FORGOT about how going to a good university means having access to everything ever written by anyone about anything, anywhere. (Oh, LexisNexis and JStor, I’ve missed you so.) The electronic resources are leaps and bounds ahead of where they were during my undergrad years. If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the library.

Puppypuppypuppypuppypuppypuppypuppy. I’ve been waiting for certain Big Things to be settled before deciding on getting a dog of my very own. I needed to figure out if I would be living here for a while longer (check: new lease + grad school), if I would be living on my own (check: it’s likely, anyway, that G. will be remaining on the other side of the country), if I was ready to be the center of someone’s world (check: a solid year of me-centeredness has been a good exercise, but I’m happier when it’s not all about me).

I am officially on the lookout for the right dog. I thought I’d found him but was dismissed from consideration (I’d like to adopt a rescue, if possible) because I’m not at home all day–it was a minor heartbreak, and I continue to harbor unkind thoughts about this particular pup’s situation, which is none of his fault. I’m not in any hurry, though–I’m still working out my routine with school and work (I am looking for the kind of little dog that likes hanging out more than running and fetching), and my finances do remain tied to Mom’s estate. But I’m looking.

Speaking of the estate, things are at a complete standstill, likely because I am now being ignored by both my realtor and my attorney. I suppose it’s possible that the realtor has taken yet another vacation without setting up an out-of-office response…but the long and short of the matter is that I’m getting zero service from the professionals I need to rely on in Vermont. And I need the assistance of the attorney to deal with the crappy performance of the realtor, so…I’m not enjoying this. Not one bit. It’s true that I don’t mind being a bitch from time to time when people are falling short, but doing it for very long causes internal wear and tear.

Also? I’ve started seeing things about Vermont that either weren’t true when I lived there or just weren’t part of my existence. I have even, thanks to Prop H8, had the discomfitting experience of being more proud of being a Vermonter than of being a Californian. I never thought I’d see that day…for better or worse, Vermont for me is tied up with a lot of things that don’t have much to do with the state itself. And this experience with the attorney and the realtor is bringing me back to “all the reasons I left.” (Which is inaccurate. I left because my parents moved us. These are “all the reasons I stayed gone.”)

Planned and unplanned reunions. In two weeks, I’ll see some people I cannot WAIT to see again. I may also see one or two people I could happily go a lifetime without seeing. There’s no way to know or control the latter, and, despite a healthy confidence in myself and my table manners, there is apparently also no way to control whether I think about it.

California dreamin’. McFunkinstyle just got back from her own reunion(s) in California, and we were talking (over passable burritos) about how trips back home are incomplete without decent Mexican food. I don’t know if I’ll get to Azteca in Dublin (or if it’s even still there), but I will get a couple of pounds of California produce cherries. And I will eat them until my lips tingle.

The continuum of grief. There’s probably another post coming up about dealing with losing Mom–you’ve been warned. The grief, it comes and goes, usually in waves. Sometimes they’re gentle and I float for a while, and sometimes they knock my damn bikini off and I duck down before anyone sees too much.