Now What?

I miss writing about my drive. Though of course I don't actually miss the driving. I'm not really sure if anyone will check this now that I've arrived, but figured what the hell. I'll post about my first couple of working days in Santa Cruz.

Man, the first few days of a new job are exhausting. Lots of paying attention, being nice, being in a good mood, trying to always listen and ask questions and absorb. By the end of the day, I am whipped. I really like it so far though.

Today was my second day and I got to just take a walking tour, by myself, around campus. I was handed the crappiest map on earth -- and we all know how good I am with decent maps, think about me and a shitty one -- and told to be back by 1. I had a lovely walk, it's so beautiful up here. Walking through the redwoods. But, I got totally lost. I ended up walking out of the redwood path onto a road somewhere very very downhill and far away from where I began. That didn't matter though because I found myself staring out at the beautiful ocean. It was pretty amazing. I was pretty far down the hill and it was quite hot today and of course I am wearing a black shirt, so I decided to take a bus back up to the top. Lazy Neile. I went to the bookstore, which is in the same area as the student union and, seriously, it could NOT be more different from U of M. It looks like a ski resort. I am not kidding. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but will take some soon and show you. You just won't believe where I am working now.

I found out that my work space will be in a TRAILER that was slated for the dump. Just like the SoM, space is hard to find. They want me supporting the plant and facilities people and they are down on the south side of campus. I call it Base Camp and what it means to me is that I won't have to ride my bike all the way up the hill every day. I'm pretty stoked about that. I'm not quite sure what it means to work in a trailer, but I really don't care. I'm happy here. They pay me well, I have health insurance, I can still ride my bike to work and I get to come home to Miriam every day. Oh yeah, and the ocean is 10 minutes away. So, it's not so bad. I have yet to see this space, so we'll see how excited I am after that. I had this fear today that I'll have to pee in a port o potty outside the trailer like a construction contractor. My foot is going down about that, if that's the case. I really doubt that's the case.

There are so many things I have to do still. Get a bus pass, get a rec building pass, find an rball partner (I miss our games, Ron!), etc. So many things to do to make this my home. Slowly it's all coming together though. M and I decided to get a small storage spot for extra stuff until we find a bigger place. We'll be looking for a two bedroom after the first of the year. Until then, anything that we don't need or want on a daily basis will go to our satellite apartment down the street.

Well, so that's all I have to report right now. Work will start to get a bit interesting when I get my accounts set up and whatnot. I still don't have a UCSC email address. Turns out, it'll probably be something really lame like neileris. BAH.

OK, I miss you all very much and think about you often. Please write or comment. I love hearing from you.

Take care.
Neils