Getting ready for my India trip… February 19, 2012

I’m REALLY looking forward to my trip to India!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, what? The one in less than a month? Why would you think I mean that one?!? Silly reader.

But really, I’m still feeling pretty ambivalent about this trip. I’m not a great traveler or adapter. My “firsts” and “big events” within this family have not typically been pleasant.

I was raised to be a sturdy farm girl, though, and I can buckle down and get done what needs to be done. I need to meet A’s extended family in India, particularly 90-some-year-old Ba (gotta love Indian record keeping — she’s not sure how old she is). I also need to learn to travel to India. That’s just how it is, and so I’m going to do it. But I’m not going to pretend to look forward to it, at least not here, because this blog is my Secret Garden (rereading that book, and surprised by the blatant racism, though I loved the bit about “it’s not our way” being the end.of.discussion with Indians).

What I am looking forward to is around trip 3 or 4. Sometime when I know what is going to happen, and thus am better able to prepare for it (although A and Ma are doing their best). I know that A loves going to see his family in India, just as he loves going to see his family in NJ. I love [reasonable length] regular trips to NJ, too — it’s just the initial stuff and the big events that suck my life force — so I have reason to believe I’ll love regular trips to India, too.

I also hate being the center of attention. I particularly hate being on the spot when I don’t know the “right answers.” When we were first engaged (i.e., I was first being introduced to the family), a certain uncle put me on the spot with an awkward question, and I couldn’t quite make out the words with the combination of his accent and the complete lack of logic/context. It was clear I was supposed to answer more than yes or no, but after asking him to repeat himself three times I still didn’t understand. I forget how it was resolved, but it turned out that he was asking me if I knew what A’s sister would be to me (incidentally, I know I’m bhabi to her but still have no idea what she is to me, I think I’ve psychologically blocked it thanks to Uncle dear). After one of my worst fears came to life (I was on the spot, I couldn’t understand him, and I didn’t have the right answer), my nervousness about meeting new people and going to new situations increased. Wedding experiences that were chaotic and mostly meaningless didn’t help much.

OK, so I can also talk myself out of it. Uncle is actually quite nice, and his son had bought doughnuts in case I couldn’t eat the food at that event. I’m probably the only one who still thinks about that moment (most people probably wouldn’t remember it even if I asked), and A told me that it was really an odd question from Uncle and that no one would have expected me to know or been surprised that I was a little confused. And our wedding was soul sucking, but it was beautiful and nothing catastrophic happened, and we’re as married as we can get (I feel like that phrase needs a “, bitches!” at the end of it). So really, nothing THAT bad has happened when I have been in these situations.

But I still think of this trip as a necessity. We’ll be rushing from place to place, and Ma warned me that it wouldn’t be a restful trip (in a “I want to prepare you because I know it’s going to be hard for you, and preparing you is one of the best ways I know to help” kind of way). We’ll condense some of the meeting and visiting by having a family party (or two or three, I’m told), which will be its own kind of draining. I don’t plan to be very adventurous with food, especially because a few days being sick wipes out half our all-too-short spring break trip. And I don’t expect to do any real sightseeing, though we’re hoping to get shopping done.

I am excited, in a way. And I’m grateful that we can go, financially and time-wise (even if it’s just for a week). But I guess I’m more looking forward to the growth that will come out of this trip — that at the end of our week-long visit, these people will no longer be names, they will be faces and bodies and laughter and homes and hearts; that I will know what it is like to travel by plane for more than 24 hours at a time; that I will not just recite so many things I have been told about India, I will actually say them from my own experience and with my own perspective. I will eat a banana and say for myself if it is actually half the size but twice the flavor. When we discuss the coexistence of religions and integration of religion into aspects of everyday life, I will understand A’s points in a way I cannot now, and I will know if I actually agree with him.

On this trip, I also expect to see a side of my husband that spends most of the years dormant. That awakening makes me nervous, not in a Not Without My Daughter way, but because I have seen glimpses of these cultural roots, and I know that they are deep and strong, but I also know that he keeps a wall between his everyday American life and his Indian life. I know that he guards his Indian heart carefully, from a childhood of being questioned by Americans, and I know that he is most easily hurt in that area where I am least familiar or qualified to explore.

Perhaps most of all, I am nervous because during this trip I take both center stage and backseat, and that is a difficult and exhausting line to walk. My culture and comfort zone needs to be flexible for us to have the kind of trip I want to have, and I want to be open to all the people I will meet, and to the new ways I will see my beloved. If I could simply hang back and observe it all, I would be ok, but I expect to be constantly pushed to interact, to say how I like this and that, and to show that I am a proper wife for their little boy. I understand all this, and am ok with it…but the logical result is that I’m not excited about this trip.

I’m excited about the trips when I will be another wife coming to visit, and I will know who my husband will be during the trip, and can anticipate what actually will happen and what supports I will need to get through it all. I may never be able to hang back and observe, but I will not be making a first impression on an important person each and every moment of the visit. For now…I believe that my husband and MIL will do their utmost to support me, and I believe I’ll get back in one piece! Everything else is, as my dad would say, just gravy.

Living simply: Inspired by Padmini February 6, 2012

I was originally going to leave a VERY long comment on a post on the blog Padmini’s Vorga, but then I decided to make it a post of my own. (And then I must work on my stats project, really.) Check out her original post, “Trying to Live with Less Luxury,” here. Padmini talks about choosing to live in a way that reflects how most of the world lives, despite the availability of Western amenities. What initially grabbed me was “Hey, I’m living without a dishwasher or microwave, too!” As I read more, I started thinking about what kinds of decisions A and I make to live simply. Our motivation and lifestyle are different from Padmini, but I’m glad for the opportunity to read about her life, and to reflect on mine!

We recently had to change apartments, due to the mold and headaches, even though we are leaving the area in 6-8 months. Our new apartment has no dishwasher (or option to use your own), and does not come with a microwave (but our last two apartments did). We had a week without a microwave when ours died last Thanksgiving, and we’re going to see how long we can make it without one in this apartment! Partly, we don’t want to wastefully buy things for short-term use (bad for money and the environment), but mostly we have no counter space as it is. We do have a toaster oven, which helps a lot.

We don’t value cable very much (although we do love us some trashy tv), but have done Netflix/Hulu Plus and rabbit ears (only got one channel). Now a cable package is included in our rent, so we canceled Netflix/Hulu Plus. If we miss Netflix, we’ll go back to it, but we’re trying to be very aware of where we can cut excess in our lives.

We bought a new car when our old car started having expensive maintenance issues, but we did a lot of research and bought a simple, small car that we’re very happy with. We share the car and choose living spaces that are near public transit and/or our school/work, so we can walk or commute easily.

For us, I think living simply is more about being intentional about what we buy, reducing waste, and increasing our value of what we have by not buying needless items. Frequent moves and sharing small apartments can be very motivating! For example, I’m careful about what books I buy now, because I know that I have to store and move them. (OK, I cheat with the Kindle, but I do library books more, too.) Another example is that, when we needed chairs for our kitchen table, we decided to buy really nice outdoor folding chairs (that we will keep and use in another capacity for years) rather than really cheap kitchen chairs (that we would have given or thrown away in a year or two). They look a little funny now, but it’s a better long-term purchase.

We have a really nice TV, and we put a lot of thought and discussion into that decision (we always watched things on our laptop and wanted to spend more down time together, so we thought a nice TV would help with that, plus we wanted to buy a TV that we would love for at least 5-10 years), and we value it so much because it’s the one really luxurious item we have right now.  We still make mistakes and impulse-buy junk, but we’re also trying to be better about getting rid of those mistakes (again, moves are a GREAT time for doing that!).

Many of our decisions right now are short-term. They are based on having a grad school income, living in tiny spaces, and moving frequently with inter-state moves looming ahead. We eventually expect to make one-to-two professional salaries, live in a larger space (although we may choose a smaller space as part of our lifestyle, and because I don’t want a house so big I can’t afford to keep it as cool as I want in the summer!), and be settled in a home for the foreseeable future. We both worry that we may lose some of these “living simply” values then, but we also both want a lot nicer things (like furniture that is not just a very-worn-out futon, and at least some drawers that are not made of plastic). I think our key for balance will be staying focused on what is really important to us, and investing heavily there. And, when there’s no moves left, there’s always trashy reality tv about hoarders.

Something sweet from the Daddy February 6, 2012

This weekend, during a call with A, the Daddy said that he had read that migraines can be triggered by caffeine and chocolate, and kept saying that I should stop those things.

It took several attempts for A to actually get it through that I had already tried stopping caffeine and chocolate, as well as alcohol and artificial sweeteners, with no benefit to my head. The only thing that seemed to trigger more headaches when I started back up with caffeine, and I’m not sure if that’s actually because caffeine is a trigger or just because my system was totally flushed of it. I don’t have any problem when I take Excedrin Migraine, which has caffeine, so who knows, maybe it’s just in my head (literally and figuratively). Anyway, the Daddy apparently missed all the conversations about everything I couldn’t have when they were there over Thanksgiving. Not really surprising.

Something that was surprising? The Daddy is in a medical field and has to do educational credits to maintain his license, and he decided to take some credits about headaches.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. This is how the Daddy shows that he cares. Ma and I can bond over jewelry, clothes, movies (we went on a movie date together once — I spared the Daddy from seeing Eat, Pray, Love), and generally sitting together talking, either just the two of us or the whole family. Moments like that with the Daddy are more rare. However, the Daddy has worked incredibly hard at a career that he chose because it was lucrative and reliable to provide for his family, not because it resonated with or fulfilled him. He never complains when we call with questions about medical stuff or other areas he has experience in.

And now he went out of his way to learn about a condition that has wreaked havoc in my life. My headaches were totally absent when we were living in our new (mold-free) apartment with nothing in it yet, but now that we moved all of our stuff (which is NOT moldspore-free), my headaches are slowly picking back up.

Maybe it won’t make a difference, like it didn’t last time, but I’m going to try going off chocolate again for a week or so. Maybe I’m just doing it because the Daddy has affirmed my place in his family in a way that even throwing a big wedding couldn’t do, and trying out his advice is the best way I know to show him how much it means to me.

Absent January 22, 2012

Your comments on my last post were really quite touching! And now, in yet another unfair move of The Situation That Must Not Be Named, I have been absent and expect to be absent quite a bit for the next few weeks. In short, we do have evidence that the mold in our apartment was causing my headaches, but our complex refuses us to release us from our lease, and the only available apartment we can move into is directly above Mold Central.

We’re doing a lot to fight this situation, which is time-consuming. I’ve also started a blog about tenants’ rights in my area, in an effort to use my skills to (a) help our case, (b) draw attention to the need for better information and organization, and (c) help other tenants be treated with justice and fairness. I use my full name and personal details on that site, so I do not feel comfortable linking there from here, but if you are facing tenant-landlord issues and would like some resources, feel free to email me at alittleofthattoo@gmail.com. I can tell you what I know about my area of the Midwest, and the general things I’ve learned.

Once again, your comments were so very sweet, and I genuinely wish that I could have kept up the blogging roll I was on when I asked for you to get more involved! Here’s a snippet, to tide you over:

We’ve been eating our meals upstairs, with no furniture, and as simple cooking as we can manage. Today we picked up frozen Indian food, because we have a ton of paratha in the freezer and it sounded yummy. While he cooked, I fed the guinea pigs, and  I called one of them “Miss Gloria” while I gave her hay and pellets. A teased me about being very Southern today, so I started calling them Gloriaben and Nellieben (“ben” is the Gujarati “sister” suffix, which is added onto names for respect — so technically I probably wouldn’t be respectful to my guinea pigs, but I equate it with “Miss Gloria”). Then, as I sat down with my plate, I told A that it was somehow easier to eat on the floor when we were eating Indian food, because it felt less wrong. So perhaps our frozen Indian food consumption will go up while we wait for everything to be resolved, because I don’t mind eating on the floor as much!

Come out, come out! January 16, 2012

I have no idea how many readers I actually have. I mean, I can see my stats, etc., but I don’t know what that actually means. I do know that I have gotten to know so many women through blogging — it’s actually kind of a problem, because now we don’t comment on each other’s blogs anymore (or sometimes even blog as often!) because we keep up in other, more private ways.

However, I suspect that I have at least some readers, who I would love to be interacting with (obviously we have something in common, if you’re interested enough to read what I write!), who never comment and don’t have a blog of their own.

And that’s cool. I follow a lot of blogs that I never care to comment on, despite being a commenting fiend on others. Usually, I don’t comment because it’s something I see as “consumable” or more tangential to where I am in my life now, like I Dream of Clean, Pinterest, You are Drunk, or Rage Against the Mini-Van. Sometimes, I comment rarely because the person seems to have an established group of followers they interact with, is in a very different stage of life, and/or I’m a little in awe of her wit and have high school band geek flashbacks, all of which apply to one of my favorite bloggers, Kirsten at The Norwindians. The last reason I don’t comment is because I really love a site and might want to email a link to personal friends, and don’t want to risk having comments that link to this anonymous blog floating around on it. (Yeah, still trying to figure that whole “to be or not to be” with anonymity thing.)

But I really do want to assure you, I’m not blogging to hone my skills for a novel, make money, or feed my ego (ok, a little bit to feed my ego, let’s be honest). These motivations are all fine, but my motivations are to (a) entertain myself, (b) sort my $#@* out, and (c) meet new people. And when (c) is happening steadily, (a) and (b) seem to take care of themselves.

I don’t want to pressure you to comment. This isn’t a sales pitch or an altar call. But this IS an invitation — I get a lot more out of the blogs I interact with, so if you want more from this blog, come get it! Wordpress and gmail accounts are a dime a dozen (cheaper, actually). If you’d like to join the online community (which has, admittedly, been sluggish as of late) but are worried about privacy, create totally new accounts! If you’ve been thinking about starting a blog…I would love to have guest posts, especially from people who don’t typically blog! There are so many great stories out there, that could be great resources for intercultural couples going through various phases of the “panic period.”

For those who blog regularly and those who’ve never written a blog post: If you had one story to tell my readers (whoever they are), about any of the topics I touch on in this blog (and they are many), what would it be?

January Fifteenth January 15, 2012

I’ve stopped calculating your age each year. It’s getting to be hard, I have to literally do the math instead of just tack a couple extra on. It’s 2012…it’s been 10 years. I guess that makes this year’s tally easy. 57 today.

You’d probably be mostly grey now. I imagine you would’ve started dyeing it at some point. You were lucky, the greys just blended right in with the hair you’d called “mousey brown” and dyed blonde when I was a child. You’d have more lines perhaps, but it’s hard for me to imagine you changed.

I can’t track you like I used to, thinking where you’d be, what your favorite this or that would be or how we’d do things together. It’s too painful to try to follow all the “what-might-have-beens” out ten years’ worth of changes. You told me you wanted to move to South Carolina. After the dust settled, he told me you had wanted it to be with him. I barely knew him, just a coworker, a friend, a voice who was sometimes on the other end of the phone when I picked up.  Gentle, kind. He said your souls intertwined. I wish you had gotten the chance to let your lives intertwine, too. I wish you had gotten so many chances.

What I wouldn’t give to have you at a time like this. Everything seems out of control and overwhelming, and I wish I could call you up. Every once in a while, I still miss you so much I can’t breathe. Every once in a while, I can’t comprehend living in a world without you, can’t wrap my brain around a world that goes on day after day without you in it, even though I’ve done it for almost 10 years now.

And although I have gone through so many changes, and lived over a third of my life (and my entire adult life) without you, I look forward to the day when I become closer to you than I have ever been, and understand you more than I ever have: the day I become a mother.

Missed my goal January 14, 2012

So my big goal was to FINALLY get my India visa app out. THIS WEEK. Umm…I didn’t quite make it.

I was going to take it yesterday…but then I got to thinking, this edition is two months old, and they had changed something small in the two months between editions before that, so why risk sending it in as is? Better to make sure it’s still the current one, right? No one wants to waste $200 in fees and shipping, plus the time.

But I thought of this just as I was ready to go pick A up from work. Ok, I’ll just fill it out later that day (Friday), and we’ll go mail it early Saturday. So I did fill it out and print it, and they did change another small thing (now they give you a barcode to tape on the front of your envelope). Wasn’t critical, but probably not a bad idea.

Then today (Saturday) I was getting everything ready and double-checking it. I had already taped the barcode to the front of the envelope even…and then I realized that I put down A’s date of birth instead of mine! I remember the question even. They’re nowhere near each other on the form, but the website asks for your spouse’s name and nationality, then asks date of birth and sex. I remember pausing on sex wondering “Do they want mine or A’s? I guess they want mine.” So apparently I assumed they wanted A’s date of birth, but at least stopped the madness by giving my own sex.

We were about to go out the door to an Indian buffet for lunch, which means we hadn’t really eaten much of a breakfast, and I’m just so over all these stupid little things happening with the visa. I forget whether A volunteered or was voluntold to do my visa over again, because they don’t give any way to edit for mistakes, and everything is linked by your ID so I don’t trust just changing it on the print-out or even the electronic PDF. Again, who wants to risk wasting $200, or worse yet, screw around with their passport and ability to re-enter their own country? We’ll see how quickly he actually does it…if he doesn’t, I guess I just won’t go.

Yes, I’m still wildly ambivalent. I believe the trip will be exhausting and, though immensely important, will not involve much quality time with anyone or any time to things on our own…and, as he’s never lived there and can barely speak and not read at all in Gujarati, and barely understand Hindi, our independence in India is limited. It doesn’t help that my headaches are still, though nowhere near as bad as before, not quite “under control” by my standards (even on preventive meds), and The Situation That Must Not Be Named is still wearing on my soul.

But tonight I went out with a friend and met some new people, which was a lot of fun. She invited me to go ice skating, which I had like zero desire to do…but she’s the friend who I ditched due to the Shoe Debachle on New Year’s Eve, so I decided to go anyway, and had a fantastic time! I actually found myself telling her I’d love to go ice skating anytime (though we’ll try a weeknight, when it might not be so crowded!). Although I love all my virtual peeps (and of course my hubs), it’s no replacement for real, live, nearby-but-not-married-to-you friends.

When’s the last time you said “yes” to something you didn’t think you’d enjoy? Was it worth it?

The little things January 13, 2012

It’s the first week of school, and I have probably driven A to work, for no other reason than to spare him from taking the bus, as many times as I did the whole last semester. In fact, neither of us has been on a bus since early December…we’ve been driving each other to and from campus all week.

Part of it is that it’s cold, and we’re out of the habit. It’s not so bad to get in the habit when the weather is nice, or stay in the habit as the weather slowly falls apart…but after weeks of break, it’s a shock to the system to suddenly have to wait for the bus, exchange buses, etc. in the chill and snow. Not helping matters is the fact that winter has been slow to arrive, but it’s finally down in the 20s and 30s with a bitter wind, after a very mild December…so we’re not even used to it being cold, or riding the bus, let alone riding the bus in the cold!

But mostly…it’s something we can control, and can do for each other, and so have both been doing freely. It’s a little hassle that we can take off our plates for now, while we figure everything else out. I’m finally starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel with The Situation That Must Not Be Named. It won’t truly be over, but at least the worst stage of it — the living-in-between — should end within the next two weeks.

Earlier this week, that time frame seemed ages away…but now, it somehow seems manageable. And I think a big part of that is both of us letting go of the little things, like taking the bus, and taking care of each other. I’m so glad we don’t always live like this, with disposable everything (and a quickly draining gas tank), but for now it’s what we need, and I’m glad we’re both willing to take it.

India will think I *really* want in! January 10, 2012

I’m finally getting my visa out this week. No, really. Really!

A had agreed to take over the task months ago (when I was overwhelmed by headaches and life), but it still hasn’t gotten done. We both tend to procrastinate, but this is getting out of hand (I seriously started Project: India Visa in, like, September). I read a lot of ambivalence about going to India in my sluggishness. A’s not here to defend himself, so I’ll hold off on interpreting his actions (especially because I would not be generous). 

But once they do get my visa, they will be convinced that I am sincere in my desire to visit their country! Why, you ask? Because someone forgot to take his fancy-schmancy resume paper out of the printer. Sure, I could print it again on normal paper, but why waste ink and effort miss an opportunity to make an impression?

Dude, where’s my normal? January 9, 2012

I love Indians. They make me smile. During A’s conference, we stayed in a little X Inn hotel. Sure, the conference hotel would have been more convenient, and was much nicer…but we’re in grad school, and mama needed a new pair of shoes! (No, literally, we saved more money than I splurged on my shoes. Well, if you don’t count the on-sale Asics and the “SuperFeet” insert A bought, because the man just can’t hang out in a Nordstrom’s shoe department for that long without buying something. Oh, and he learned that his left foot is a half-size bigger than the right, too. Our kids are so freaking screwed.)

Anyway, A checked us into X Inn. The night desk clerk was on duty, but he saw from a plaque on the wall that the hotel was owned by Gujaratis. I interacted with the presumed owner a few times, and he was very friendly and helpful. On our last night there, I asked Mr. X Inn Owner for recommendations for vegetarian restaurants (the trip had not been good to me food-wise), figuring he was likely veg and would thus probably know where to get some good grub. His eyes lit up, “Oh, you’re vegetarian?” And then I told him my husband was Gujarati, and he got very excited. Perhaps my favorite moment from the trip: “You should have told me! I would have brought you food from home!”

Mr. X Inn Owner warned me that he was alone in town for a few years and the restaurant pickings were slim for veg-heads (unless, apparently, you notice that the owner/manager of your discount hotel is of the same ethnicity as your husband and ask him to bring you food from his home). But he dutifully gave me directions to an Indian place, which we were skeptical of (he wouldn’t say it was good, just that it had a new chef and changed its name) but which turned out to be pretty good (granted, we stuck with safety dishes, just in case).

A never did meet Mr. X Inn Owner, due to the conference schedule, but when I was checking out he asked if I had been to India. I said I planned to go this spring, to Mumbai and to the smaller town in Gujarat where A’s family is from. Mr. X Inn Owner’s eyes got all big and round, and for a moment I thought he was going to say that his family was from there, too. “That’s where my friend from school was from! I bet your husband would know him!” Actually, my husband grew up in NJ, but his parents might. Although I did like Mr. X Inn Owner, I had no interest in playing the Indian 20 questions to find out how we’re related, especially because I can’t go very far in the game (and A couldn’t have gone much farther if he were there). But I love that about Indians, too, even when I don’t play along.

A and I decided to add a little side-trip to Atlanta onto our boring conference vacation, which was an excellent decision on our part. Our friends in Atlanta are much more outgoing, put-together, and altogether snappy than we are, but the last time we visited them (last summer when I was at a conference in Miami), we were crashing with them during their moving week (in case you wondered, we’re the worst). So although this visit was just one night and was last minute (did I mention that we’re the worst?), it was really great to hang out with them.

Unfortunately, A didn’t sleep well there. See, our friends have a pet snake, who lives in the living room where we slept. They have an L-shaped couch, and you can bet your sweet ass I was quick to claim the arm of the couch that was furthest away from the snake. I do ok with the snake as long as it’s not suddenly moving around its cage, particularly while I’m intoxicated (it should be noted that the last time I had vodka was during the Miami visit to these friends — I’m a lightweight, the doubles were not kind to me, and I decided to accept that vodka does not love me back, even when I slurp mine and then steal A’s lazily sip it in a pool on a Miami evening). Anyway, although A made fun of me not being able to walk pass the snake’s cage like a normal person that night, guess who had trouble sleeping because he was too close to the snake? Yup. On the bright side, A found his awesome hat that we bought during our San Diego honeymoon (another conference…yes, this really is how our lives go) but he lost in Miami…apparently in the back of his friend’s car (we called around stores we’d been to, but apparently didn’t think to check the car…I don’t think it was even the vodka night!). They didn’t know whose it was and were using it as a decoration on their built-in shelves, but A only noticed it minutes before we left. Phew!

The worst part of the trip was that, for once, neither of us was excited to come home. We’re in the middle of moving, but we’re not sure where (part of The Situation That Must Not Be Named), and for now we’re basically camping in the apartment above ours and then running down to ours to shower, cook, etc. It’s not a good time. We just want things to be normal again…but they won’t be, for at least a few more weeks, maybe longer. At least we have our guinea pigs back, though. A friend “babysat” them while we were away. Yeah, they got fatter. Yeah, we knew they were going to. Yeah, there’s a correlation between friends who will volunteer to petsit for you and friends who will overfeed your pets, even though you warn them that your pets will do everything possible to convince them that they’re starving when they’re not. But it was kind of nice to know that we missed them…good confirmation that, although I often wish we were in a place to have a dog right now, the girls are special to us and do add something to our lives.

Head seems to be doing better…not perfect, but better. I think I’ve wrapped up my physical therapy and have started adding more normal things back into my life (like chocolate, thanks be to the deity of your choice). I’m still avoiding caffeine, because it just doesn’t feel right (I think just because my system is totally flushed, but I could be sensitive to it), which I’m fine with. I’m trying to stick to moderation in my alcohol use, which isn’t hard because we’re boring and barely drink (and don’t keep vodka around). I do want to get back into a sleep schedule, but the new semester should help with that. Speaking of which…bed is calling my name.