Heads up if you're in the market for this cooly-engineered product. I was super excited about it, but the first one failed and now the replacement failed. Save your money. Also, the phone support person wanted me to join a video chat to troubleshoot. That's unreasonable to me. Don't buy.

We have two other dyson products that have been solid. This thing in particular is bad.

It was a bit more urgent. In the prior case, the call came from his wife. He'd tried to kill himself, albeit poorly. I listened to her freaking out and then asked her to give me an hour.

Some 45 minutes later, I call her back and ask what she's doing tomorrow at 4 p.m. She seems a bit confused, and I explain that my flight arrives in Charlottesville at that time, and do I need to plan ground transportation, or can she pick me up?

This is one of those things people don't really know about me. Yes, I'm brusque; yes, I'm an asshole, but if you want someone who has been there and will travel, I'm a useful guy to know.

In that case, I said roughly what a close friend did after my first suicide attempt on encountering him in the basement: "What the fuck were you thinking?"

I'd specifically asked for him to be left unaware of my flight, because it hits a bit harder that way, and his wife still seemed to be surprised I was flying out tonight, and was therefore willing to put up with what I proposed.

I brought a six-pack of Fat Tire; it was not yet nationally distributed, and you could still bring liquids on a plane. So as I was berating him for dragging my happy ass out there, I also handed him a beer and showed of the set of three pint glasses I'd brought (it was a set of four, but one broke in my carryon, and those get sharp).

Anyway, I knew his dad was coming by over the weekend, and I wanted to get there first. His dad was the principal of the local middle school in my first paper's coverage area. I'd met him a few times; great guy, classic Virginian minus obvious racism. I respected and slightly feared him in our previous interactions (I was, after all, his granddaughter's godfather).

So I know my role here. I've been where he is. And what he needs right now is normalcy. Friends around who won't judge, who will bring beer and who will be present for what is to come.

We watch some movies in the basement, occasionally hang out on the deck, but it is all a distraction.

His dad arrives, and the conversation goes about as expected: him needing to get his shit together, that sort of thing. He wasn't an ass about it, but he wasn't going easy, either.

And when it's all done, he turns to me and asks what my flight cost. I demur, he pulls out his checkbook, stares me in the eye and says "you flew out here to save my son's life. Now, how much did the flight cost?" And he cuts a check for that amount (which was a relief on journalism wages and having put it on credit).

My first wife says that instant booking was the moment she knew she wanted to marry me.

Anyway, back to 2026. I'm on the phone with my college roommate, and we're just shooting the shit. I explain I brought up what the house does for Thanksgiving and basically got "it depends if we're doing it here or one of our parents."

He brings up hoping his brother will invite him over and then reveals his mom will be there. In general, this is rather standard for Thanksgiving, but in this case, it is a wall. She did, after all, at the behest of her new husband, falsely accuse my roommate of assault, landing him in jail for nine months as he refused to take plea bargains for something he'd not done.

So, as reasons for not wanting mom around go, this one is pretty solid.

I mention that we'd talked about me visiting sometime this month on his dime and ask if he'd like me to think about that. "You? Here? For Thanksgiving?" His voice cracks. "Yes, I'll pay for the flight -- get a one-way ticket; you don't need to go home."

He's not the sort to break like that. Looks like I can get up there for about $400. "How about I just stick around until after Christmas? The house isn't going on the market until January."

This of course requires conversation with my housemates, as I'd really rather not pay rent for a full month I'm not here, but that's an issue for tomorrow.

Scott's dad died a few months ago, and unlike what I've just gone through, he was living with his dad (who, incidentally, officiated my first wedding), so every day is a living memory. He is in a rut, and he can't find his way out. I can't fix this from Texas.

I've already started asking about backchannel Portland, Ore., burner connections, as I think that's the sort of community he needs.

And yes, it's easy to say that I'm simply imposing my own structure on him, but that's not true. He literally inherited a woodshop. That's fucking gold for burners.

He's not going to be comfortable among them, as I look positively extroverted compared to him, but that's why I need to be there to make introductions. He'll soon learn this is the community he's been looking for: quirky, blunt, no need to deduce subtext, and mutual goals.

I've watched him struggle for a while, and I love him.

Our freshman year, I came down to the old house for Thanksgiving, and I fucking hated it. Because it was his domain, and his friends from high school. But 1998 was worse, with my parents flying me down and us going out to dinner.

For 1999, I was back, and I endured an unpleasant drive up to Victoria, B.C., and back to retrieve my mythical Canadian girlfriend just to dispel notions I'd been full of shit at dinner.

When I returned to the Pacific Northwest in 2003, I was back at the old house. By now, Scott had access to prime rib via foodservice, and we ate well.

Point being, Thanksgiving was inadvertently our holiday. So when I heard about his extant option and knew the background, the only thing I could say is "what if we do it?"

And he's sobbing. It's so fucking clear how the news of his plans hit him, and I'd be a shitty friend if I didn't provide a better option. Especially as this is coming out of his inheritance, not mine.

We've cohabitated in a far smaller space than his dad's house. That's a nonissue. But I'm not only there to be the reason he enjoys the holiday; he can't find his future, and I think I can help.

I'm 11 days out from that, and in three days is the first anniversary of his death. (Do you really want to go to Arizona before fall again?)

And I had the chance to talk in serious terms with my mom about my upbringing on a mixed trip overall.

But that's not where my brain has been residing since my return to Texas. Instead, it's been about where I zigged when I should have zagged. Introspection, if you will, admitting to myself that I have made some incredibly stupid choices.

While the vast majority of these owe mostly to external circumstances (I needn't rehash the decline of print media since 2001; suffice to say, there, I was a leaf in a stream), it's the big ones that owe them to my youth, hubris and a feeling that I can do better.

Exhibit A is my first real relationship. I'd had a singular girlfriend in college in 1998 ahead of Rach, but I was 18 and really just wanted to get laid. So she was the type I tolerated for transactional reasons, but I have certain expectations out of conversation, and she didn't meet them. Of course, she was madly into me, and I couldn't grasp why.

But by the start of autumn quarter 1998, my freshman-year social circle was dead, between dropouts and friends finding, you know, interests that led to us starting the long tail to "someone I used to hang out with."

I was out of the dorms, and despite a terrible first experience at The Daily in April that made me swear I'd never set foot in the newsroom again (the other vow was "I'd make a better opinion editor than this asshole"), I needed a job, and despite having a car, being able to work on campus was my preference.

As it turned out, the entire senior staff had been replaced between spring and fall, so the newsroom I walked into this time was a completely different environment.

So I walked in and filled out an application, and thus began my illustrious reporting career consisting of two stories and fucking hating it. As luck would have it, my second piece was edited by the ed chief because the news ed was out, and as I was walking out of his office, the phone rang. I only heard his end of the conversation, which opened with "actually, we are looking for designers."

I'd tried design freshman year of high school, with Beginning Yearbook. I did not follow the rules, questioned the advisor constantly, demanding better answers than "that's just the way we do it," and that became my only F. She was also the newspaper advisor, so that door was closed. But despite that, layout never fully receded into the back of my mind in the ensuing years.

So, I turned around, waited for the brief call to end and said "Actually, that's something I might be interested in."

I've told this portion of the story many different times in many different ways, since I've now had 28 years to think about it. To retell it here is to talk about success, not failure, so I'll sum up.

Rach didn't want to hire me, but the ed chief insisted she needed to train staff as freshly minted management. It was, in retrospect, such a classic tale ... just not on the timeline most expect. I thought, in return, that she was a complete bitch, and that design wasn't going to stick as an interest, either.

That lasted all of three days, when I decided this particular brand of geometry and learning the editorial process holistically was my calling -- a mix between system integration and creativity. The only issue being I was complete dogshit at it.

I woke up in her bed four days later after an ambush she orchestrated to get me there.

And after switching between apartments nightly (my cat was nonplussed with missing mealtimes due to me getting laid) until our leases were up, we got a lease together in January to save money.

So, she is the reason newspapers finally took hold after two false starts. After our first weekend together, another designer started, and by the end of the month, we were all inseparable.

This is unabashedly good news: In under a month, I'd found my career, my first true love and a complete social circle!

But I was 19 and wanting "the full college experience." This was a good run so long as the ed chief was in office, and he turned out to be the glue holding my life together. By spring quarter, he was gone. At the end of said quarter, the other designer had dropped out.

Rach and I took this in stride, but then one night in June, I got a message on ICQ from the woman who'd taken me to my first rave just after I turned 18, saying she was back in the dorms for the summer. And my feelings for her, while unrequited, meant I was going to do everything I could to spend time with her.

And this meant turning full raver. Rach would come with us sometimes, but the music was not her idea of a good time, and I've never been good at hiding an interest in someone else.

We broke up ahead of the start of the new academic year but still were in each others' orbit. I was now the opinion ed, and she was managing ed. After I got a new girlfriend in Victoria, B.C., I returned to the office one Sunday and Rach immediately said "I can smell her on you."

I didn't say we were professional about this. But we weren't ready to disconnect just yet. In fact, skipping a lot to get to June 2000, I went to a rave on my own and met someone in line who I felt would make a fun companion for the evening. She enjoyed her free tab of E, but then basically headed off to dance.

Despite rolling, myself, I was crestfallen and sitting on the floor toward the back of one of the rooms.

"There you are," someone says. "I knew it had to be you; you're the only person here who looks as lonely as I feel."

I turn around to face Rach and insist that my night is going just fine, though I've never been good at hiding facial emotions. I say I'm just taking a break as friends are dancing.

The girl who'd disappointed me did her own thing for the rest of the night, and three weeks later, her shenanigans would lead to my first suicide attempt, so if I'd instead been honest with Rach, told her I'd fucked up ... who knows?

I was afraid of having a stable, sorted out life so early -- that I simply must be missing out by accepting a straightforward trajectory. So I rejected her out of hand as a path forward, not backward.

Turned out she was moving to New Mexico soon, which I didn't find out until I was an a hotel in Taos that August. She immediately drove up from Albuquerque, and we hung out, but she was still with my former best friend I'd introduced to her in Canada, and apparently things were moving apace.

She sensed that something was very amiss after leaving my hotel and returned an hour later under the guise of having forgotten her sunglasses to find me half-passed out, empty bottle of Tylenol on the nightstand, a few beer cans strewn about the room and a suicide note still sitting in my manual typewriter. She called 911, then my dad, followed the ambulance in her car, and when I came to in the morning, she was still holding my hand in my room, where she remained until my dad made it up from Phoenix.

That's the last time we saw each other.

But the agonizing part is I still could have stopped the train. We would have had a lot of work to do, but it could have been done ... I just decided, well, not to. She got married the following year.

It would take until 2009 to feel that spark again, and that time the beginning was the error.

On the drive back to Phoenix (I had to get my car out of a Taos lot), Pop said to me, "You know, she loves you very much." And I said I loved her, too, but with the way things were going with my old friend, I felt stuck.

"Well," Pop said, "that's your choice."

thought I would try starting a thread for this! basically, what's something recent (or recent-ish) that you experienced that you consider a "win"? could be something big, or something small! we'll take all the wins we can get, here.

for me, the primary ones that are localized to my life would be that my dog made it through surgery okay last month and that I am trying to learn linux server stuff again and actually feel like I'm getting it a bit more. I love learning things, but I honestly feel like I'm terrible at this skill set in particular.

also, making this post! I have been around before but I'm relatively skittish in social spaces just because of previous experiences. haven't had any bad ones here, just memories making it hard to shake and actually participate.

I'm looking to refresh my podcast subscriptions with thoughtful, insightful, non politics stuff (enough of that already in my subscriptions). I'd love some recommendations for:

• Techie stuff for a luddite like me
• Long form explorations of a single topic
• Video gaming (loved the video game historian but he stopped)
• TTRPGs and game design
• Reading and Writing
• Absolutely no interest in art, finance, crypto, cars, sports, aliens, murder/horror/crime, or influencer style conversation casts (Rogan or Piker)

My current subscriptions are to:

• Dan Carlin's Hardcore History
• Disasters Deconstructed (though I'm not liking the academic tone anymore since I left this career, so stopped listening as much)
• Ralph Nader Radio Hour
• CBC podcasts, a wide variety on politics
• Autocracy in America
• NPR Shortwave and Planet Money
• John Stewart
• Trevor Noah

Edit: Wow! So many great suggestions. Thanks!

Let's imagine for a moment that you're in the house of the owner of Arizona's first Rolls Royce dealer, and after his 89-year-old wife has adequately prepared a bolognese, he wants help getting into his email, as Anthony skipped lunch.

My life is a fucking dichotomy at this point. I have rejected capitalism and am planning a commune, yet I have a soft spot for a multimillionaire who provided a chilled white from the Valais.

Oh, he's also the honorary Swiss consul. Just another day at the office.

Returning to Arizona has always felt weird because I know why and how I was raised, but it simply isn't me. Elsbeth asked some question about the artistic director of the Phoenix Boys Choir when I was the soprano soloist, and I ask if she knows Herbie is now running it. Max jumps in and asks what happened to the Austrian, and I'm like "Georg Stangelberger? He was a disaster for the choir."

Because, you see, I am actually that guy.

I am back in Texas tonight, having negotiated Phoenix roads without actually thinking. I don't drive in Austin on autopilot, but drop me in fucking Scottsdale and I can debate fine policy points while also knowing I need to be one lane to the left in 1,000 feet.

I don't like that Paradise Valley is where I simply need no directions. It's a terribly uppity place now, but it wasn't when I was growing up.

A.J.'s was not A.J.'s in the '80s. It was A.J. Bayless, and simply a small grocery store, not the absurd monstrosity of expensive food it currently is.

But, you see, that's where I grew up. It's just home. It looks really high-end, but the Bentleys are in the garage.

When Elsbeth asked to see where we'd deposited Pop, we had to go up the road a bit to get her a decent view. Via the garage, where of course there's a Volvo as the daily driver and two Bentleys and a Jag.

Because that's who I was. And I fall back into it easily. But it's not at all who I am now.

Hakeem Jeffries had a moment last night. Standing in front of a crowd of well-wishers and hopefuls, he delivered a speech. A speech that will go down in history as a big ole nothing burger. A speech that is now, less than 12 hours later, largely forgotten in the political and collective memory of an otherwise monumental moment. I surmise this is because he lacks the commanding presence and leadership qualities necessary to serve as Speaker of the House.

His charisma, if it can even be called that, is more akin to that of a Home Depot bag of paver sand. You search through the poorly stacked pile selecting the one with the least holes. Yet, despite that effort, it still spills it’s contents all over the cart on the way to the register. Not a good look.

If that does not speak for itself, then consider this. As a potential Speaker, Mr. Jeffries would face the immense challenge of uniting a fractured party that has not managed to maintain a large and diverse tent of voters since Debbie Wasserman Schultz declared Bernie a non-starter. Mr. Jeffries is simply not capable of standing firm in the face of political opposition. Don’t take my word for it. Perhaps, instead, the ever present consumer advocate Ralph Nader may sway you:

More introspection may lead you to ask yourself whether you are up to leading the House Democrats in their immense and immediate tasks of policy and program restorations and adopting our Constitution’s mandated Congressional independence from the Presidency for the protection and advancement of the livelihoods, peace and freedoms of the American people. There is no indication that you are so willing and prepared. Unfortunately.

His record in Congress has not demonstrated the kind of bold, decisive leadership that the position of Speaker demands. Instead, he has often been seen as a cautious, moderate voice. Dare I say, a voice coming from a very real human (I swear) with a spine made of NeeDoh.

Let’s be frank. In times of crisis or when tough decisions must be made, the leader of the Democratic Party and Speaker of the House is not merely about personality. I understand that. Such positions require a deep understanding of the legislative process, the ability to negotiate, and the resilience to withstand the political pressures that come with the position. Jeffries has not consistently shown these traits in his career. For any informed observers, this must raise serious questions about his suitability for such a high-stakes role.

Finally, to convey my firm belief that Mr. Jeffries is not the right person for the leadership role come January, I paraphrase the amazing Forest Whitaker in his role as PFC Edward Garlick in “Good Morning Vietnam”

Hakeem Jeffries sucks the sweat off a dead man’s balls. I have no idea what that means, sir, but it seems very negative to me.

First. This is US politics. I can't seem to post there. Anyways...

While the stunning gains are welcome, a reminder. There is no political solution to the problem of today's United States.

The country remains ignorant, unpredictable, and woefully unable to offer its own people the most important trait of a democracy. Empathy. Yet the results today offer a shred of hope that rebuilding could start early. You have to start somewhere afterall.

However, Its going to be a long two months with the Jan 6th crowd still in power. They need to transfer that power now. An armed and militant paramilitary still does trumps bidding. And many know they might be held accountable in the months to come. I am not optimistic they will wait to see how it plays out.

Stay vigilant down there.

for the first time i realized i cant really [politely] ask people at work about voting. in previous jobs/election cycles its a no brainer.. running around the office 'where's your sticker? did ya vote?'. regardless of affiliation, people should vote..

but theres a palpable embarrassment this year. no one speaks of politics here anymore. i sure as fuck am not going to burst that echo-bubble by askin if they voted.

i just cant really do that in my current location. very strange.

I've been trying to ease her into certain things, but she doesn't remember me running the 2000 election, nor does she seem to think I had any experience for my first job.

We needn't talk about fisting here, but it's crucial to the past 17 years of my life, to my detriment.

We were at dinner tonight ... nice place, great Caesar dressing, and it became apparent that she, at 79, doesn't at all remember why the fuck I didn't just get into journalism but accepted it as my life.

She seems to now think it's random that I worked at the paper, sted "Holy fuck, I didn't know what love was."

I've got a couple of things prepared for our drive tomorrow, but she seems oblivious to what made me who I am.

I learned about the announcement via Discord at about 20,000 feet (Southwest's Wi-Fi could use some help).

But of course I couldn't really do much in terms of looking up tributes when I was getting throughput akin to 14.4K speeds (ask your parents).

Thankfully, some 50 feet above ground level at Sky Harbor over the south runway, I have something new to worry about: a sudden 10,000-foot climb. Not the sort you do on a normal takeoff, but rather the sort where the engines start making noises you simply don't hear on a passenger flight. No one was alarmed, but we talked with our neighbours about how usually a descent onto a runway ends with a landing.

The pilot, and I think rightly so, gave us about 10 minutes of circling completely around the airport (once again giving us an approach out of the east guaranteed to provide a long taxi back to Terminal 4) before coming on the intercom to let us know that a takeoff had stalled on the runway, and as such, the option other than pitching the fuck up (not his exact words) was hitting a stationary object directly in our path. (This was at roughly 1405 MST^[this is correct for Oct. 29; most of Arizona does not observe daylight saving time, and I first changed a clock when I was 18 in college], and I'll be curious to see if a near miss is reported on.)

You might be thinking, OK: So an actor died and you didn't. And that's fair as far as I've gotten in my day.

I'm a bit out of sorts when I finally meet up with my mom, who'd arrived from New Mexico nearly two hours earlier. I've not been able to vape for at this point six hours, and learning you narrowly avoided being a statistic gets the ol' adrenaline going.

PHX now has a "Sky Train" that takes one to the rental-car area, which we had to board, and my mom at this point needed a wheelchair for this odyssey. This of course means it's best if I drive.

Well, the entire fucking airport has been reconfigured in terms of traffic since last I actually drove in Phoenix. Being in a rental, one has to be careful, but this is not a city where driving defensively is rewarded. My mom of course is telling me that I needed to take this exit or that one, "turn here" ... that sort of thing.

I got us to the hotel at least a half hour earlier than her routing would have led to. But that's what happens when you apply 1990 routing to a 2026 layout.

I headed to Fry's (it's a grocery store here; fun fact: The Fry's grocery store is related to the defunct electronics retailer, hence it starting out as outpost.com) to pick up water and a six pack (my adrenaline was not going back to baseline), and cracked one open as we discussed plans for the afternoon.

It should be mentioned here that we are here to spread my dad's ashes, nearly a year since he died.

She wanted to scout out the entrances to trails on Mummy Mountain that used to start across the street from our house but have long since been replaced by multimillion-dollar homes. I'm pretty sure we found one that still makes sense up a road you only know exists if you grew up hiking there, but we're not going to be able to make it to the spot that would have made the most sense.

At this point, we've lost light and are ready for dinner. New issue: Everywhere that existed in the '90s no longer does. I head up Scottsdale to Shea, expecting a Macaroni Grill just before the intersection, but it's gone. So, I head into the shopping center with the Safeway we started going to after the one on Camelback shut down.

I did point out that my phone suggested Ruth's Chris a couple of miles back, but that was a nonstarter. Neither of us was dressed correctly.

So I pull through what seems like a gateway to nothing. "This will get us over the the Harkins side." And on that side we find a wonderful Italian place. Quick, friendly service, fantastic mango hefeweizen. We dine al fresco despite my mom's misgivings that it will get too cold ... in Phoenix ... in October ... by 7 p.m., she does indeed secure a table outdoors while I park the car after dropping her off. (Yep, that's now my parent, not my grandparent.)

Much has gone through my mind in the 49 weeks and some change since Pop's death. It was kinda nice to be able to leave it at back of mind in the ensuing time, but that's not why we're here just now.

All things end. Not just all good things.

But between the news about Stewart, my reason for being in Scottsdale in the first place and having my first brush with mortality that wasn't my own fault, I decided the heavy conversations need to come first. Because my mom won't live forever, either, and she's now needing to be dropped off at a restaurant, so that's a bit of an indicator that if you want to actually have the talks you need to, best to do that while the opportunity is available.

I eased in. She had a lightbulb moment when I mentioned, "Haven't you ever noticed that I tend to say things from TNG in standard conversation? No kid says 'avail yourself,' and my cadence in terms of when to use contractions and when to skip them stems directly from the writers of Star Trek."

Murmur of agreement.

"So, then, why is it that you and Pop did everything to avoid accepting neurodivergence as part of my issues growing up?"

Now she's confused.

"OK, as an example, dropping out of UW" -- mind you, I'm saying this wearing the sweatshirt I got from the bookstore on my 1996 campus visit -- "because I was so infuriated by having to write 'Hello, World' despite over a decade in programming that I decided the entire system was broken."

Here, there's a bit of recognition.

I mention that over the past few years, as I've entwined myself further and further into the burner community, the recurring motif is "how is it that no one told you that you were on the spectrum?"

"Something I've seen reading about ASD that pops up with some regularity is 'justice sensitivity.' Now consider how I ended up in journalism. Not because I wanted to be a journalist, but I had to call out incorrect framing, leading to a terrible first column that then got edited to make me sound racist, and the cherry on top of that was the art that ran with it. A normal person does not vow to take over the entire section because the initial problem has now been compounded. But once I had a goal, I was laser focused."

"Well, back then, we knew you were smart, and awkward, but no one really talked about autism. It was reserved for kids who couldn't function."

"Remember how I refused shoes with laces after learning about Velcro?"

"Oh, yeah, you hated those laces."

"Because they were unnecessarily complex."

A beat.

"We really didn't know what to do with you. We tried to keep you interested in things, but we both failed in a lot of ways."

From here, it goes into details about both my parents' upbringings that I knew about but hadn't before heard distilled.

The reasonable takeaway is now I'm a lot less stressed about the next five days. I may not like all the places we go, but availing myself of the opportunity to have the conversation I couldn't with Pop seems prudent.

And I suspect Jean-Luc Picard would agree.

We've been trying to make things work, and some days it feels easier than others. But lately, it feels almost impossible. The constant misunderstandings, the short tempers, the emotional exhaustion, it all starts to take a toll. We're both trying, yet somehow we keep finding ourselves in the same place, feeling drained and disconnected. How do you make things work when even trying starts to feel exhausting?

I wrote about some formative years in my life where I found success... then had to start over.

I was laid off at my then-local paper in August 2014, which I'd known was coming because I was only hired knowing the copy desk was being centralized later that year. There was no plan to come down here.

I got unemployment, but a third of newspaper wages only goes so far.

After several months of attempting to find work locally, I reached out to the director in Texas who'd offered to immediately hire me when centralization hit but offered an insulting pay cut.

By April, I was worn down enough to reach out again. He was willing to negotiate only an 18% pay cut, but that's still a lot better than zero dollars, and the household wasn't functioning.

My ex and I bonded over being equally manipulative back in 2009, so I get the U-Haul and announce I'm moving to Texas.

It worked.

Simply saying I was going to wouldn't have. She had the only vehicle at the time, so "moving in what?" would have been a valid initial question.

But this was not my goal. She'd already said in August that Texas was not an option. And so I stayed in rural Oregon, interviewing for media-adjacent jobs ... school PIO, tech at a TV station ... but the UI benefits run out at a certain point, and if you have one "can you start tomorrow?" up your sleeve, that's the only remaining option.

In terms of manipulative things I've done in life, this likely ranks as a 7/10 short-term, 10/10 long term. But I saw the options as being homeless (again) or an unpleasant move -- I'd explicitly forbidden Texas my entire career (I may have been able to start my career a few months earlier had I been willing to move to San Angelo in 2001), so this was practical, not a goal.

She has to have known at some level that it was a farce. Not the job, but the U-Haul. I'd packed nothing up, and there was no discussion of division of particle board. In no universe am I getting out of there in a day.

However, this brings her to the table with a sharper sense of reality in about an hour. I think that whole charade ran me $30 all-in.

And later that day, I call the director and say I need to push my start date back by a couple of weeks. Then we start planning the move properly.

Perhaps not as properly as hoped. I arrived here by train on Memorial Day 2015, and flooding meant I had to get off the train at an ungodly hour without sleep to get on a bus for the final leg.

Not that the trip was any easier for her. She lost her stuffed animal in a hotel and nearly got arrested in Nevada for her wedding collar (it's apparently a deadly weapon).