Living

Someone asked me the other day about how I was doing, and I had to think about it for a few minutes.  I settled on the following--I am living the dream, with better coffee and a whole lot less money.  I do think that sums it up.  It is a great opportunity to live in a vibrant metro area, and I so enjoy that.  My apartment, with its recent additions of FOUR book cases, is starting to feel like a home  And,  I can mostly find my way to a grocery store, a gas station, a place to get Chinese/Japanese/Vietnamese/Mexican/Italian food, and I I have reached the exalted status where the local baristas know that I want a large light roast with room for cream.  And a pastry of some sort.  Have I arrived or what?

It isn't to say that it has been a seamless transition, but I think that I have had worse.  Now it is just that pesky task of finding work.  I have applied to a few places, but that is a priority task for me this week.  The question I have been struggling with is whether to just find some type of a job (without a hairnet, of course) to bring some money in and to give a bit more structure to my daily life.  I still would like to teach, but with enrollments down all over the state there aren't too many extra classes floating around but I am still in the process of looking for those last minute openings.  And there is that big question--do I stay in higher ed?  Do I write a resume with a college degree on it, vaguely state that I did some administrative work for colleges and apply everywhere?  I honestly don't know about that one.

In the meantime, I am learning more about and enjoying my neighborhood.  There is a great farmers' market with innovative pastries and vegetable thingies, I think, but I am not as sure about thosw  as I am all about the pastries.  I live about 5 blocks away from Lake Harriet, a wonderful place for a three mile walk, and coincidentally right near one of the better Italian deli/restaurants in town, and if they don't have pastries, they do at least have really good bread.  Walking around the lake is real treat.  First of all, nature has blessed the trail by making it flat and then filled it with puppies and all sorts of interesting people.    That there is a band shell at the half-way mark with music or movies six nights a week doesn't hurt the appeal of the walk, even if there aren't any pastries at the band shell.  There is ice cream and wine so I am not adrift in the desert by any means. There are speedo-friendly beaches, so I am sure that I will fit right in, though I would  fear the great white whale rescue team and their incessant efforts to push me back in the water if I did happen to show up.  It's those pastries!

The photos are mostly self-explanatory.  Be sure to click on them to make them bigger.