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06/02/2005: "a book, a pig, and letters for letters"

It feels as though I haven't posted for months. That's not because it's been just over a week, but because of what's happened in that week. Nothing earth-shattering occurred, but my father-in-law's 60th birthday party was headquartered at my house, which made for 4 days of routines out the window, and general mayhem. It was a good time, but next time I'd like someone else to host it all.

Late last week my wife and I had to blitz the house, picking EVERYTHING up in order to expose the floor we've been rumoured to have, so the cleaning lady we had scheduled for Friday could come and clean it. This was in preparation for the coming of the in-laws (father, mother, and sister) on Saturday, and the 60th birthday luau bash (with accompanying extended family and friends visiting) on Sunday. The party was a huge success, the pig was delicious (we got someone to cater a 46lb pig roast), and I now have more left over alcohol in my house than I've ever had in my lifetime. Now everyone's gone home, our kids are back on schedule (I think), and we can start (yes, just start) the process of finding our house again.

Meanwhile, the little white cabriolet sits quietly in my driveway, but with a slight difference. First, the ownership has finally been signed over to me. Now I have to get over to the Ministry of Transportation and get all that paperwork on my end complete. Second, the shop manual that I ordered has finally arrived, all 520 pages of down-and-dirty technical how-to and troubleshooting. I know why fan speeds 1, 2, and 3 don't work, but I still have to figure out why the spedometer/odometer is dead while the tachometer is still kicking. I've got a lot of reading to do, and once I'm done that, I have a lot of wrench-wrangling to do. I can't wait!

In the background, my application for grad school is still ticking away. I finally got a response from one of my former professors that I'd requested a letter of reference from. Two e-mails, one hand-written note, and a voice mail (and about a month and a half) were all that was required to get something out of him. To be fair, the summer school term had just started, so I know he was busy. At least the deadline is still months away.

So now I have my online grad application complete, my paperwork has been sent in, I have commitments for the three letters of reference I need... pretty soon this whole process is going to be wholly out of my hands and will turn into a waiting game. With so much job searching in the past three years I'm used to waiting, but this will be a very different kind of wait. I'm hoping for a swift decision, lest I sit on tenterhooks for months on end.

Now I must go rectify the one last remnant of the invasion of the in-laws - a sleep deficit. I won't catch up any tonight, but if I'm lucky, I won't fall any further behind.