What it's like to work at home while you have a bowl of Halloween candy ready.

Let's get OREOS, OREOS!

Since updating last I have taken the GRE and the MAT.  I've gotten a couple of shades above average on both tests, which I am totally fine with.  Now I just have to do all my writing.  Yay!  I've taken a couple swings at my Statement of Purpose.  I've hit a good chunk of writer's block.  But it's not in the shape of a block.  It looks more like a tetrahedron.  damn...

Anywho, since my life in Ohio has been much more stationary than my life as a Texas middle school theatre teacher, I've gotten a little out of shape.  Yeah.  Just a little.  GET OFF MY BACK!

Everybody's body works in a different way.  Mine puts on weight in a very odd way.  At least it seems odd to me.  It only accumulates on one part of me.  It doesn't gather on my arms, or my legs, or my neck, or shoulders.  It only gathers on my stomach.  So, I don't look like a guy who is kind of out of shape.  I look like a healthy pregnant woman.  Instead of a baby made of human parts it's a baby made up of Chipotle burrito parts.

And you thought this was an exaggeration.

On Sunday I decided to implement a simple, short exercise regimen that I could do every night and wouldn't need weights.  This week was supposed to be the trial run.  Here's the regimen:  25 squats, 25 push ups, 25 sit ups.  So, here's how I looked on Sunday:

I may look like a moron, but I'm a happy moron.

Not pictured:  The Cat trying to attack my face.

Not pictured:  my tummy.

Not any problems.  I got it done.  (though, I'd be lying if I said I didn't decide to switch from 50 to 25 during my push ups.)

Here's how I looked last night:

I've got "bad dancer's" legs.

I got through 10 and then my abs went on strike.  I think they're somewhere on Wall Street now.

Not an exaggeration.  Immediately after starting I fell flat on my face.  It wasn't worth it to stand back up.

I'll try again tonight but it's not looking good.  I am not fit.  I am by far the least fit member of my immediate family, siblings, and parents.  I'll keep you updated on my food-baby.  I believe I'm entering the 23rd trimester.

And now for The Obligatory The Cat Picture:

It's the flash.  He doesn't always glare at us.  Just usually.

It's been longer than a Month

So, yeah.  Sorry I left y'all hanging.  (I know you are all on the edge of your seats.)

I was going to post as soon as I got a job.  Well, here's a pictorial representation of my September:

Needless to say, no job has been gotten.  The closest I came was a theatre where I could work and act, which is the upside.  The downsides are long hours, very low pay, and inability to visit relatives and friends around the holidays.  That last one was the kicker.  The Wife saw how sad I was about that prospect and suggested I see if any grad programs excited me.  If I could get an assistantship like her than we'd be pulling in the same amount that I pulled in alone as a teacher.  (This is still more than I'd make at the theatre.)  There are four programs that I like at Ohio State ranging from theatre studies to education policy.  I take the GRE next week and I'm a little nervous about it.  The MAT the week after that.  After I apply I'll look for a retail-like job.

Why is everyone on the GRE website smiling?  That's false advertising.

That's all that's been going on here with me.  The Wife started school a couple of weeks ago.  She's doing homework a whole heck of a lot of the time (and I want that?)  She enjoys it so far.  She really likes her fellow grad students.  They don't judge her Perry the Platypus lunchbox.

And now for this week's Obligatory The Cat Picture!  Today he's watching Ancient Aliens:

The answer to every rhetorical question is, "aliens."

Pollen, the sinus' Mussolini

Hello!  I haven't been updating too often because, honestly, not too much has been going on.  The search for employment is ongoing.  I'm going to start looking for more menial work.  (Human resource in bigger companies, etc.)  I'd love to be a teaching artist, but I'm having a hard time finding that sort of work.

ANYWHOO, The people who lived here before us planted beautiful flowers here before they moved out.  Or, they were beautiful before we neglected to feed or water them.

Such a disappointment.

Only problem is:  they're lilies.  And, contrary to what one Dallas area baker would have you believe, The Wife is allergic to all lilies.  Whenever we're downstairs she gets all caughy, eye-wattery, stuffy and headachey.  So today I told her that I'd get a shovel and "take care of the flowers."  (Say the stuff in quotes like a character from the Goodfeathers.)  Here's what my trip to the store looked like:

Why does the sun have a beak?

 And here's what the return trip looked like:

He lost his eye in the big one.  Don't bring it up.

(Before you get all excited and proud I didn't walk to the store.  I walked to the store from my car.)

So, I can't dig up the flowers today.  Partially because it's all rainy and partially because the dirt by the flowers is pretty thoroughly mud.  I'll do it tomorrow.  I brought The Wife's favorite Disney movie upstairs and we are watching it now since, you know, she's trapped upstairs in the tower and all.

If you have any job hunting tips or know of any teaching artist jobs in the Columbus area let me know.  Thank you all!

And now this week's obligatory The Cat picture:

He's under the bed, and the camera flash does not amuse him.

LOOOOOOOOONG overdue

So, we moved in about two weeks ago.  We had a couple of adventures, unpacked a lot of stoof, and got bit by The Cat.  I'm sorry that I didn't post pictures until now.  I'll try and be better about updating more regularly.  If I don't have any good stories I can regale you with stories from the past couple of weeks.

But for now, pictures of our house.

The front door.  It sticks really bad so when we leave we go out the back door.  When we come back we can get in through the front, but I have to kick the door in.  This is what I was doing when our neighbor introduced himself.

Here's the view when you walk in the front door.  The wife rushed out of the room before I could catch a picture of her.  I'll probably get a picture of Bigfoot before I catch one of her.

Our living room.  Complete with cardboard box fireplace screen.  We have to wait until the winter to get a real one and we really don't want The Cat rolling around in a dirty fireplace.  (He would.  Just to spite us).

View from the couch.  The Wife discovered a reality show called "Dance Moms."  Lucky for us there's a marathon on today.  yay.

Our kitchen.  It's much smaller than our old kitchen but we're making do.  Notice the Texas flag above the stove.

Our bar counter, which is now the microwave counter.  We didn't have a lot of food storage space so we got these temporary cabinets.  The delivery guy: "What did you get?  Nothing from Amazon is that heavy."

Our bookshelf, complete with Disney hats, Spider Piggy bank, and James Roday autograph.  Top row is fiction.  Next two rows are nonfiction, mostly media studies.  Bottom row is comic book trades, yearbooks, and Engagement scrapbook. 

Dining room.  The dining room table collapses to be about a foot wide.  It also has drawers.  Super classy Ikea.

This was the lighting fixture over the dining room.  We hit our heads on it and it was kind of super ugly. So...

...I changed its ass!  It was the most manly thing I have ever done.  GET OFF MY BACK!  I'M A THEATRE TEACHER!  I OWN A MAKEUP KIT!

We put up pictures of our friends along the wall.  We want to put our family pictures up somewhere else but we haven't decided where yet.

Our bathroom.  For some reason there is a big honkin' window in our shower  We trimmed and hung up a cheap shower curtain over the window, threw away the excess, realized that you could still see through the window, got another cheap shower curtain, hung it up.  You can't make out shapes through the window but it does give the bathroom a creepy green glow.  Also, notice the pockets on our shower curtain.  It may not be fancy but it gets the job done.

Here's the light fixture above our bathroom vanity.  I don't know how I feel about these.  I had an excuse to change the one in the dining room (hitting our heads).  Maybe once I have a job I'll get something to put here.  Then again we're renting...

Here's our bedroom.  Complete with engagement painting, The Wife's desk, and empty hamper.  (The bag of the hamper comes out so we can carry it downstairs).

The other half of our bedroom.  The Wife got a vanity because of the size of our bathroom.  It was hard finding one that didn't make our bedroom look like it belonged to a five year old princess.

The Wife: "Honey, where is the cricket bat?"
Me: It's in the basement, why?"
The Wife: "Could you bring it up here?"
Me: "Why?"
The Wife: "Protection."

The Cat's litter box.  He TOTALLY MINDS the flowery mat.

The basement.  Where did we get all this stuff?

More Basement.  (The pink bag is the bag from the upstairs hamper).

Here's the obligatory The Cat picture.  It's no box fort but it will do.

Well.  I hope you like them.  I'll post again next weekend.  Hopefully by that time I'll hear back about employment.

No. We haven't moved yet...

..but we're getting there.

So far we've packed all our books, movies, and everything from our desks.  Well not everything.  We threw away all the junk that we had nonchalantly thrown onto our desks when we weren't thinking about it:  junk mail, school paper rough drafts, a half eaten cheeseburger.  You know, the things you just forget about.

I'm happy to report that the number of boxes holding our books outnumber the number of boxes that hold our DVDs.  (I'm not mentioning the fact that a good number of these books are old text books and comic trades.  Nor am I mentioning the fact that our books are, on average, bigger than a DVD case.)  We're so learned, like Planet Vinci's football team.

 The Cat does not know why there is a big stack of boxes next to the window, but he's not complaining: 

Dance, puppets, DANCE!

He, like most of the feline persuasion, likes to be above people.  Both physically and emotionally.  He also loves looking out the window, so this whole box thing is a win win for him.  I'm guessing he's not going to be too happy once we start driving.

Back-story:  The Cat hates the car.  He doesn't just hate the actual car, he hates the IDEA of the car.  Whenever he is in the car he yowls.  Not meows...yowls.  Also, when he is done making sound he doesn't close his mouth.  He just stands there, slack jawed, for a good couple of seconds after he stopped making the sound.  After he finally closes it you think "Maybe he's done,"  and then he yowls again.  His longest car ride was 3 hours, and that was God-awful for everyone (and everything) involved.  Austin to Columbus is 20 hours.

The Wife and I considered giving The Cat a sedative for the trip.  Just enough to give him a nice calming buzz.  We tested it on him in the apartment a couple of weeks ago.  Here's how the experiment turned out:

Before the sedative:

Artist Depiction

After the sedative:

New Artist Depiction

THERE WAS NO CHANGE!  None.  We asked the vet and she told us that most cats will fall asleep.  Very rarely will the sedative make them more hyper.  And even rarer than that it will have no effect.  Awesome.

We'll try and grab some video of the pathetic noises he makes from the road.  Next time I update I'll either be in Ohio or on the way.