Other than seeing A Very Long Engagement, which you can read my opinion on in the entry right below this one, my weekend consists of making a powerpoint presentation for work. Thank god they pay me for this (and I need the hours, so it's fairly welcome). Basically all the work I've been doing there thus far really will culminate into "Management 101," the training seminar for first-time managers. The two manuals that I retyped are two-thirds (a very disproportionate two-thirds, might I add) of the materials for the seminar (the third being a paltry 11-page, error-ridden performance management manifesto). Unfortunately it's taking forever (I've made approximately 41 slides and that has taken me 10 hours, consolidating and formatting pre-typed information), but tomorrow's job should be more time-consuming yet more interesting --- among other things, I am going to do research on the internet and write a crash course in employment law! And who said temping was for dummies?

Also, my trip to DC this weekend was awesome. My bedroom is done and beautiful. The house is enormous and beautiful. It slowly accumulates furniture. The cat has taken up residence beneath the bed that I bought, that cost so much (thank god it's the most comfortable thing evAr) that I almost threw up when I gave the guy the American Express card to pay. I have a new red comforter. Rachel and I bought a pretty shower curtain with sage green leaves on it for our bathroom. I appropriated the "women" bathroom sign from the lodge and stuck it to the door promptly upon unpacking. I can't wait until the day that we have a party and a drunk male person staggers up the stairs to use the bathroom and, dissuaded by the sign, staggers off to find the men's room.

While I was in DC I went to Target approximately four thousand times. In the end, I think the only things I actually kept were the desk chair (exciting, leather, on sale!) and the receipt book (exciting, clear plastic, a dollar!). The amount of things I bought and took back....I don't have time or energy to enumerate here. Also, there is a Krispy Kreme right around the corner from our house!. Thus I also consumed copious delicious hot Krispy Kreme doughnuts. Already I believe we have discovered the trick of the sign (if the old-fashioned "doughnuts" part is alit, there is fresh, hot deliciousness to be had).

Tegan and Sara dropped off the couches and my dresser and a load of other shit on Monday morning. The driver was a pessimist and didn't think the couches would fit through the door but he was wrong. Chris the bass player (who is such a sweetheart) got up at the crack of dawn to help unload things. Expertly I tightened the bolts on the dresser legs (the dresser that is older than me, bought in 1972 when my parents had been married nary three years).

That night T&S played a show in DC at the 9:30 club. It was hella awesome. I got backstage passes for the girls who came (unfortunatelly I was only allotted five), so me, Rachel, Darcy, Kimberly, and Micha got to rock out backstage. I think all of them were suitably starstruck for the occassion. The show was one of the best I've seen. Unfortunately we didn't get to hang out too much, but they said they're hoping to do a college tour in the late fall, so they should be in this neck of the woods again soon and they'll be sure to be awake the next time they visit my townhouse.

The only sucktastic part of the trip was getting home. It only takes 1.5 hours to fly from National to Hartsfield (Atlanta airport). Tack on three hours for transit and sitting and driving to my house. So, 4.5 hours, realistically. How many did it take me? 11. How many does it take to drive (purportedly)? 10. You do the math, folks.

Happily, however, I will be taking one of the cars (assuming I can find somewhere to park it, which I am reasonably certain will happen without much fuss, although favors may be in order for whichever of my dearest most wonderful housemates ever who wants to go knock on the neighbors doors with cookies, right? right? right? to see if I can use their unused spot for free? Yes, definitely favors in order there.

So right now the tentative plan is to drive up Monday the 8th of August. That's two weeks away, folks. In an effort to drag myself out of the swampy depression in which I find myself immersed of late, I am trying to concentrate on this ever-nearing date. In a way going up this weekend was a bad idea --- it made me remember so acutely what I'm missing when I'm here. (Chant the mantra: not much longer Bromstad, hold on). I also got my packet in the mail today from GW telling when the orientation session is and all the activities that are planned. Can I possibly emphasize enough how much I am excited to meet new people and to do new things that actually interest me? A crash course in employment law is all fine and good, but it's not....that feeling you get when you read Carolyn Hax chat transcripts and realize that your problems are nothing compared to the problems that some of these people have. You gain a sense of perspective, and then you wish you were the kind of person who could help. Who will help, even if it might make their heart heavy along the way.