Blogging while intoxicated

Somewhat drunk and watching a sappy romantic movie. I've been horribly remiss about updating this blog. But suffice it to say that big changes may be in the offing. Have been accepted at two of the three library schools that I've applied to. I've been hesitant to write about this, because it's all so speculative. But (at least in my drunken stupor) I've become convinced that it's time to make a change. It's not that I really have anything against Nashville or my current job. But I feel like it's time to do something different. And this is difficult when I am stuck in my humdrum existence of malfunctioning servers and complaining users. I feel like I'm in a rut (socially, intellectually, and romantically), and it's time to use some figurative dynamite to get out of it.

It must be nice to be truly rich. Not because of the things you can buy. I think you would quickly beome accustomed to these and they would cease to matter. But because you truly have the freedom to drop everything and pursue your dreams without worrying about the financial consequences. Last night I saw a show on PBS about an English guy (whose family had an estate) who was devoting his life to finding a new species of orchid to name after his grandmother. This is the sort of thing that you can only pursue when you either have more money than God or less sense than a hatmaker on crack. In this case, I'm pretty sure it was the former.

I have to settle for finding a middle ground between total conformity and total irresponsibility. For the moment, this means looking at library schools, planning a possible trip to Spain with my parents (hopefully a chance to use my developing Spanish skills) and looking for new experiences where I am right now.

I've had another IT job drop out of the sky within a 30 minute from one of the library schools I've applied to. But this is the one school that hasn't actually accepted me yet, and I'm not sure the job would really be a good career move anyway. So I'm pondering what to do about that.

Meanwhile, my parents' house was broken into, and my mom's engagement ring was stolen, along with most of the rest of her jewelery, their DVD player, my brother's class ring, etc. This is one of those things that could be a lot worse, but at the same time it stinks. It's just stuff -- as I told my mom when she called me the night it happened -- but it's stuff with immense sentimental value. They have a detective assigned to the case, but based on the MO they don't have a lot of faith that much will be recovered. Sounds like the perps were mainly interested in things that could be sold quickly on the street for drug money.

In other news, I've spent three of the last four weekend days working on a Habitat for Humanity house sponsored by my employer. I frequently worked on construction projects in high school and college, both through theater construction and through Habitat-type projects. But this is the first time in a while that I've spent more than a few hours at a time on this sort of thing, and I'm remembering why I liked it so much. There's something incredibly fulfilling about seeing a structure rise in the course of a few days and knowing that you had something to do with it. (On the downside, whacked myself in the face with the claw of a hammer yesterday. Despite all the blood, however, this turned out to be a pretty minor injury, and it really didn't hurt that much!)