A new start

So I've been dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century by all my livejournaling friends. Hey, what are friends for? So I suppouse I'd better start out my livejournal career by giving ya'll a quick-and-dirty about who, what, where, when, and how I am.

Had everything gone according to plan, I would be sitting in a mud hut somewhere in West Africa right now, rapidly becoming the Great White Hunter. However, given how often my plans and my life actually match up, I suppose it would make a lot more sense for me to make plans to do exactly the things I know I would truly hate, as it seems that what I plan is what I'm least likely to ever do. As the Peace Corps unexpectedly deferred me for anywhere from 3 to 9 months, I would up with even more unexpected free time (see my unemployment in Amherst this summer), and no money with which to support my chocolate/tea/books/beer habit (or pay of my considerable debts, at some point. Loans are only held in abeyance while you're acivley on Peace Corps duty, waiting doesn't count). So what did I decide to do with my gift of free time? Have an adventure, of course.

So now I'm down in Los Angeles, one of the most hateful cities in a state that any proud Oregonian looks upon with nothing but disgust. But I survived Moscow, so I'm thinking there can't be much that this minor pit of villainy can offer by comparison. I mean, at least blowing up your competitors with radio-controlled mines in their front yards is not a standard business practice of the more respectable segment of Los Angelian society. On the other hand, any land in which you can't see the horizon because of a band of brown smog obscuring the place where sea meets sky should set off alarm bells in any reasonable persons head. Christ, people raise their kids, here?

I'm living with Mona in a small house near the beach. At least the pollution makes for a nice sunset over the red-tide-infested ocean. I have some issues with the four cats, but my homeopathic allergy remedies seem to be holding strong, for now. I've enrolled at the National Bartender School, and two weeks from today, ought to have my certification, setting me up for an interesting job with good return (if crappy hours), and the mystique of being the man behind the bar. In the meantime, some part-time work in a real estate office will keep me in food (Mona is generously handling the rent, with her amazing new job). In my spare time (?), I'll be catching up with my old high school friend Lindsay, keeping tabs on my dear buddies Russ and Gabe (as they adjust to their new lives in Portland, OR), get back into playing my mandolin, teach myself French, try to retain my Russian, and win my bet with Kris that I will do the full splits by Xmas (I got a free dinner coming to me for that one, baby!).

Well, that's quite a bit of me, there. I'll call it a good first entry.

From all the guys at Possum Lodge, "Keep your stick on the ice!"

- C