While in the USA I Enjoy Listening to Pandora, But Miss Watching BBC iPlayer

I’m currently at home in New York. I’m feeling a little overwhelmed by life. Not to imply that the two things are directly connected, though like everyone who has ever moved away from home and subsequently moved back (“boomeranged” as it were) I certainly do find being here a bit stressful.

I’ve actually had a decently productive stay so far, though I’m still hovering near the 0 word mark on my dissertation. I’ve registered for Health Plus, which merely required a couple of humiliating affidavits stating that I am a 24 year old woman who is unemployed and living with her parents. So it’s legal! I am officially a layabout! On paper! Still, the whole thing frees me up a bit for this awful awful job search. I can work part-time to get some experience without worrying about being hit by a truck since I am now insured for the next year. I would of course prefer full-time employment that sees me living far away from Staten Island, but bla bla bla beggers, choosers etc. Current backupish plan consists of getting a part-time museum job and spending the rest of the work week getting a certain something off the ground. We (not royal…mysterious!) had planned on waiting a few years until we got established in our careers, but judging by the difficulty we’re having even starting careers maybe it’s best to jump right in. I’d say stay tuned, but that might jinx it.

Right now I’m trying to sort some stuff for that, doing the usual dissertation nonsense (aka not terribly much), doing some novel research, applying for jobs, hanging around with family and friends (doing fun things like seeing Avenue Q, going to the beach and…fingers crossed…eating kangaroo!), and trying to keep my internal clock somewhat close to GMT. I start my internship about 34 hours after I arrive in the UK, so my body isn’t going to have much time to shake off the jet-lag. I head back Saturday, start work Monday and, dun dun dun, will be working on the 4th of July! Oh England.

Speaking of ‘Precious’

I have said before that my life, which people who aren’t me seem to think should be some sort of action-packed romp around the Continent, doesn’t exactly resemble the sort of thing that Hemingway and Fitzgerald wrote about. Normally this is a point of some consternation for me. The other day, as I wept into my mid-afternoon martini about the sheer unglamorousness of being me, I recalled this quotation from Hemingway that is just So My Life. (That’s a slight exaggeration. It was a Pims and Lemonade.)

Several days later I have mustered enough get-up-and-go to locate the quotation. Which is written in a notebook. A notebook that is sitting on my desk. The desk where I spend copious amounts of time every day.

Not that I’m doing anything productive during the time I’m sitting at my desk. You see, I am a young procrastinator. I am full of ideas and inspiration and good intentions, I just happen to be terminally lazy. That notebook I mentioned with the quotation written in it? It’s basically full of sketches and outlines of a year’s worth of harebrained schemes. Of all these things I want to write about.

Do you know what I should be writing about right now? I should be writing inquiry letters and cover letters to potential employers about how awesome and motivated I am. I should be writing my dissertation on museum education for students with Autistic Spectrum Disorders. What am I actually writing? This blog. A review of Oreo cookies for no useful reason whatsoever. Instant messages. Because I will leave the things that I should be writing and should be doing until the last possible moment, until right before it’s too late to share them.

Which reminds me…the quotation:

You’re an expatriate. You’ve lost touch with the soil. You get precious. Fake European standards have ruined you. You drink yourself to death. You become obsessed by sex. You spend all your time talking, not working. You are an expatriate, see. You hang around cafes.

-The Sun Also Rises

I really didn’t intend for this entry to sound so nihilistic and, well, precious. The stuff that needs to get done will get done. Eventually. In the meantime I have some drinking in cafes to attend to.