Dave and I drove down to Milwaukee to pick up Jon from the airport, he in his vehicle and me in Jon’s. A combination of wet roads and downtown traffic plus insane road construction made getting to the airport an absolute nightmare. His flight had been delayed so we ended up waiting quite awhile for his luggage but eventually it came through and we went off to have dinner. After some food we ended up back at Dave’s apartment, which I’d never seen before. We tossed in Adaptation (which I rather enjoyed!) and at one point went off to buy some milk so we could do coffee…which is the reason I’m sitting awake at 3 AM. I really should not have had that cup, huu.

Anyhow, it’s good to have Jon back again. The last week was pretty boring. My family doesn’t do much around Christmas so it was a whole lot of sleeping late and sitting around. I managed to read all of The Coming Global Superstorm by Art Bell and Whitley Streiber and most of the first Harry Potter book. I applied for about 25 jobs the last couple days and only got a few responses. Chad’s temp agency wants to interview me when I get back to Seattle, so at least that’s something to look forward to.

Of course, I couldn’t afford gifts this year but people were quite understanding about the whole thing and gave me things anyhow, which was quite nice. I ended up with a few DVDs, gift cards, and t-shirts amongst a couple misc things.

I decided to give away anything that I haven’t missed in the last 6 months since I’ve been gone. This includes my entire collection of X-Files books, of which there are about 30. I decided to donate them all to the public library since my mom works there and it’s easy enough to do. They aren’t worth anything anymore and it’d be tough to get rid of them otherwise. Maybe someone in Oshkosh is still interested…

Even moreso than before I’m disliking the idea of owning things. Just looking around my room at the stuff cluttering it up makes me feel uncomfortable. I feel like packing light. I have so much stuff that’s nice and that I loved a lot in the past, but now just sits there (ie, those books.) I had an entire bookcase full of books I knew I’d never get around to reading but was reluctant to give away. What’s the point of keeping them around? If I *really* want to read them I’ll re-buy them or better yet, just borrow them from the library. It’s not really much of a sacrifice when I look at it that way. I was only holding onto the X-Files books because they were part of my collection…if I wanted to locate any of the information in them I just checked online anyhow, as it’s quicker and far more efficient. There was a time they were useful but that time has passed.

I’m still not quite sure what to do with my Mulder and Scully busts (and other resin figures) though. I mean…truly, they aren’t worth much anymore, and they are nice to have, but they’re not on display and I don’t know how to transport them safely and cheaply to Seattle. I’ve considered just leaving them here until I come back for my paintings. One day I plan on renting a U-Haul van and driving my paintings to Seattle (hopefully Jules will be with me by this time since I don’t exactly want to make that drive by myself again.) We’ll see.

Jules started his new job on Wednesday. It seems like it’ll be incomparably better than his last one, so that’s good news. They are laid back enough that he thinks he’ll be able to grow his hair out again. (Even better news.)

That’s really about all…I think about updating this more often but then I realize nothing has happened worth talking about. I really hope something comes along to give my daily life more structure (ie, a JOB) so I don’t feel like I’m just floating through the days.