Of course, I’ve not had a proper summer since I graduated school, but since I quit my job at The Firm - the training program, or lack of any direction from management, frustrated the hell out of me - I’ve been spending my days getting my life into some degree of order. First came finding a car to replace the one that was stolen, oh, ages ago now. I’ve pretty much set myself on a ‘99 Ford Escort ZX2, which is being offered at three grand less than I was planning to spend on a car, which means more money for other things I need. Score! I’ll hopefully be picking it up tomorrow from the girl who’s selling it.

Second, I’ve been trying to find another job. I’ve had loads of interviews, all of them positive, but most of them pertaining to the same position I’ve decided to get out of. Let’s face it, doing sales one hundred percent of the time is not my idea of a good laugh or a long-term career. However … I’ve been called back for what looks to be the most perfect job ever. The position is that of ‘junior project manager’ for an investment firm - yeah, finance again, but it gets better - that is looking to expand abroad. The job duties would include researching various countries of interest, including all securities and business laws and requirements, and then traveling to those countries and meeting with lawyers and officials to try and set up a division of the company in that specific country. For example, last month the senior project manager went to India with the CEO, and stopped in Paris en route back to the States for a relaxing end-of-trip weekend, all of it covered by the company. Sweet. Anyway, it’s the perfect blend of my interests - international politics and law, and travel. So, tomorrow I’m to have a meeting with the CEO to discuss potential opportunities. There are only a few people up for the position - the senior project manager interviewed everyone initially, then sent the resumes to the CEO who made the final decision for those he thought fit the profile - and I want this job so badly. Plus, it’s got a great salary. No commissions, woot!

Finally, now that Meg has a job, we’re getting an apartment together closer to her work and in a less urban (more safe) area than where I live now. We found a gorgeous place some thirty minutes from here that’s affordable (I’ll be paying over a hundred and fifty dollars less per month, a nice change!), is all done in hardwood, has three large bedrooms, a huge basement, and, the piece de resistance, a two-car garage. Move in date: September first. So soon! I love it! I’m going to have a room three times as big as the one I’m in now! Let’s face it, I was about to go mental.

Anyway, so that’s what I’ve been up to, which is part of my excuse for not updating this thing. That, and my laptop has gotten so slow it’s unbearable trying to do anything with it. Once I’ve moved, I definitely want to get a new computer, probably a desktop ‘cos I never need to take my laptop with me anywhere anyway and it’s cheaper that way.

Whew.

Well, hey there! It’s been awhile.

I started my insurance course last week, dreading it, really, because one of the girls at work said it was so dull, she required a six-pack of Red Bull every day to keep going. I don’t do dull well. Anyway, I wandered into class at eight in the morning last Monday and found a room full of people of every age, most of whom were dressed in suits. By Tuesday, everyone was in jeans, including the funny Dutch man I befriended who decided that jeans weren’t the epitome of Americans, but cargo shorts and Hawaiian shirts and SUVs were. I guess that works too. Our teacher has been working in insurance since the beginning of time (read: the 1970s) and knew his stuff extremely well. As for a description … well, as one student in class aptly put it, he reminded us of “a cross between Dan Ackroyd, Chris Farley, and the dad from American Pie, the first two only coming out when [he gets] excited.” Let’s just say he was eccentric, and from that, the class became pretty entertaining, one to which I looked forward with great anticipation save for the ungodly early starting hour.

Some of Mr. Insurance Man’s notable quotables include:

• “The harder I work, the more luck I have.”
• “I feel that people who are attractive to me are somewhat weird. My wife agrees.”
• “Don’t be fooled by the size.” Response from the token wiseass in the class: “That’s what I always say!”
• “I’m coming to the conclusion that my hands are rather small for a guy.”
• “I used to hate art class. Now, that could be either a skirt or a kilt. It’s androgynous hieroglyphics!”
• “When life gives me lemons, I add salt and tequila.”

His extensive experience also offered us some interesting - and, sometimes, downright depressing - real-life anecdotes, including one about a terminally ill cancer patient that rather made me lose my faith in the American government, erm, more so than before.

Class ended today at twelve-thirty - sad, as I’m going to miss my smoking buddies - and I took it upon myself to drive to Ghettoville, NJ (also known as Carteret, no offense to those of you who may live there) in an effort to finally collect the ‘personal effects’ that were left in my shell of a car from the salvage yard there. I can honestly say my eyes filled with tears when I saw it. Yeah, I’m a sap, but that car was my baby. I was too attached to it. I had exactly the same reaction when I dropped my phone, which had an Elvis faceplate, in the toilet. Anyway, I’d never really understood the meaning of stripped. I’m still confused as to the thieves’ motives. Everything under the hood was intact, all the engine bits that are always missing from stolen cars in movies. But … the car really was literally a shell. Everything had been torn out, from the rearview mirror (which I found under a map) to the seats to the floorboard of the trunk. Actually, you could see the dashboard from the trunk. There was nothing there, save for what I’d left (minus the case of Corona … yet another reason to fume).

For those of you who do not appreciate excessive language, please skip the following sentence.

Fucking asswiping jackass motherfucker cocksuckers, ooh man, if I could find you and castrate you before feeding your tiny dicks to your mothers …

Thank you for indulging me.

It was good to get most of my stuff back. They didn’t touch the CDs, the books (they probably wouldn’t be able to read them anyway), the clothes, two pitchers my friends and I had swiped from a bar long ago, blow-up decorative Budweiser bottles, both sets of license plates (VA and NJ), or even the two tampons in the glove compartment. Well, let’s be honest, a girl’s got to be prepared at all times, right?

Right.

Speaking of which, I’m late. That boggles the mind. Immaculate conception, anyone?

Before this thing gets any longer, I’m going to go soak in the tub and read over my notes for tomorrow’s test. Hitting the Series 66 again, baby! Ooh, the excitement.

Six and a half hours a day in a classroom (technically it’s eight, but this is taking into account breaks, lunch, and general administrative duties) is not conducive to reliable, daily posts in a blog, so for that I apologize.

I’m quite enjoying the insurance course, actually. The material’s pretty interesting. There are over thirty of us, ranging in age from 23 (yeah, so far as I can tell, some other guy with one of those cow ring things in his nose and I are the young’uns of the group) to probably sixty something, from all over the world (I’ve counted a Russian, a Frenchman, and a German so far). Many of the guys are ex-military, some serving as far back as ‘Nam (my smoking buddy) to Iraq (a seven-foot-tall behemoth). Anyway. Diverse group. The teacher, Mr. W, is a riot and very good at what he does, which makes sense because he was in the insurance business for over thirty years before taking over this class in the mid-’90s.

It’s wonderful to get out at four, before rush hour clogs the roads and causes it to take an hour to go two miles near my house, and I figured this would give me ample opportunity to head on down to Cartaret to - finally! - see my car and grab any personal effects that are left, of which I’ve been told there are quite a few. But no. The place shuts at four-thirty, and it’s at least four exits down the Turnpike, so there is no way I’d ever make it. I’ll have to wait until this class ends next week, I guess.

I finally got my estimate, though! USAA is going to give me $3299, over seven hundred dollars more than I read in an online version of the Blue Book. Wicked. I don’t know when I’ll manage to go out looking for a new car, but it should be soon. I can’t hold Meg’s car hostage forever.

Speaking of Meg, we drove down to Virginia late Friday night for the weekend. Her family reunion, dad’s side, was to be held on Sunday in Maryland, so I figured this was a good excuse for me to pop round and visit my aunt and uncle while they’re in town (she lives in California and has an open-ended ticket, so she could realistically be around forever, but he lives in Vietnam and is heading off in about two weeks, and understandably I don’t get to see him very often). I also had the opportunity to chat with my mom about my future - yes, again - and it went really well. She’s being extremely supportive and enthusiastic.

I figured, per tradition, we’d meet up with Erica at TGI Friday’s on Saturday night for a beer and a chat. The conversations leading up to the actual event left much to be desired, as Meg and I got into a bit of a fight. Basically, she was upset with me because I was planning to have a beer at Friday’s and then head home; yes, in my car. Personally, I think they set the drinking and driving limit as they do so as to allow someone the freedom of having a quiet drink with a friend, and therefore have little problem with it, but Meg is very passionate about such a thing. Anyway, Erica offered to drive, bless her, so I got my beer and everyone was happy.

And then we went out to DC to see Dom. I don’t really understand how that happened, but we got to Corey’s apartment in Foggy Bottom at about one in the morning and hung out for awhile, drinking extraordinarily sweet concoctions brewed by a very inebriated Dom and listening to an eclectic mix of dance, rap, and showtunes.

The next day it took us quite a while to get down to Meg’s family reunion (extenuating circumstances included a 3-year-old, a mom playing hostess, a reckless driving ticket involving a state trooper who obviously hasn’t been laid in a few years, and a fat redneck woman - not the cool “I keep my Christmas lights on the front porch all year long” kind - who decided that her week’s amusement was to keep us from passing her on Route 5), but ultimately I decided that her family is lovely, though I’m still extremely sore from playing baseball and soccer with her 3.2 million first, second, and third cousins, most of whom were approximately 3 foot 9 inches tall and far superior to me in athleticism.

This heat is destroying me. One and a half weeks until London, baby! I’m just going to forget the fact that I have two tests next week. Mmmmm … gone. Excellent.

PS, I’m very happy that Italy won the World Cup (woot!), but I wouldn’t have been too upset had France been the victor. But Zidane - really? A red card in your last game ever? Clever publicity stunt. No one was expecting that.

I think it’s absurd that we’re expected to come into work today, even for a half day (and half is all relative, really, given that we get off at two). On the upside, we were allowed to dress ‘casual’ today, which means jeans for me. They’re about the same comfort level as a suit, but wearing jeans to the office kind of feels like sticking it to the man. Kind of.

On Friday night, Meg and I ended up hanging out with my flatmate TJ and a group of people, and somehow we found ourselves playing board games until four in the morning. How that happened, I have no idea; I blame the addictive quality of such games as Taboo and Cranium. The next night was absolutely gorgeous and breezy, so a whole bunch of us chilled in the backyard, drank, chatted, and, yes, played another game of Cranium, boys versus girls, and we girls lost again by one question. Frustrating as hell, I tell you. We’ll get them back, sooner or later.

I’m supposed to hear back from the insurance people about my car sometime this week. I’ve been looking at used vehicles on Craigslist, and I can get a pimped-out version of my now-defunct car, including the very necessary alarm system, for less than $5000. That’s the limit I’ve set myself. I’m not going to go out and buy a new car while I’m living where I am. That would be just asking for trouble, I’m sure, and anyway, now is the time to be saving money. And I pay enough in rent as it is to be worrying about car payments.

Today’s lunch break will be dedicated to getting in contact with my insurance company in an effort to figure out exactly what the deal’s going to be with my now-defunct vehicle.

The cops found my car, still running, a block from my house. The cop who ‘interviewed’ me (read: photocopied my driver’s license) said that it had been “stripped,” but didn’t elaborate. So I called up the inpound lot where my car is resting now, and apparently I can’t even go and look at the car until charges have been paid to the tow company. *grumbles* The lady on the phone then said to me, “Well, we’re not supposed to tell you what’s on the report, but …” and then proceeded to say that my baby is “heavily damaged, with broken windows,” “all electronic equipment has been removed” (bye, bye XM Radio), “seats have been stripped from the vehicle,” and so on, and thereforth. Anyway. I need to have the insurance guys take a wander down there and check out the situation. Pain in my ass.

On the upside, Big Boss Man was very understanding. However, I’ve now been informed that the insurance exam that I’m meant to take pretty soon requires a week-long class after some self-study time. The nearest location for this that I’ve found is over in Edison, NJ, which isn’t bad at all. I guess it’ll be okay. Need to get my act in gear and sign up for a course, though. I’ve only got so much time left!

Ooh. Meg and I finally got to see Imagine Me & You last night, the film with Piper Perabo that we’ve been dying to see forever. And it was completely worth the wait. That was the cutest romantic film I’ve seen in a really, really long time, and I highly recommend it if you’re in the mood for one of those ‘I’m going to eat junk food and give myself a facial’ kind of evenings.