I have been most delinquent in writing here, but since I�m pretty sure that I�m the only one reading it, I don�t think I should be too concerned. Actually, the fact that I haven�t written here is due to the fact that my dissertation is going quite well at the moment, so I�ve been busy writing elsewhere.

I�m spending the first night of September on the porch in the dark with my computer and a glass of Maker�s Mark listening to the crickets chirp and a remarkably high decibel-level. While this bucolic setting is very pleasant, it�s kind of making me nostalgic for the evenings spent on my porch in my old place in Ukrainian Village listening to the Western bus go by and to the drunks singing or yelling at each other coming out of the Polish bar on the corner. The crickets are deafening.

It�s been a long and rainy weekend. I set out to have a relaxing weekend and surprised myself by getting a lot done, including cleaning out the basement where I�ve been camping out to make a real office space. A little paint on the walls and a new rug and it will actually look like a room down there. It�s been a long time since I�ve had a room of my own. It�s long overdue. I also defrosted a freezer, made chili and cleaned the house. I�m a regular Martha Stewart, without the insider trading, of course.

While I love being married, I really miss having my own apartment. I always liked living alone. Many of my friends were downright surprised when I told them I was getting married. One said he didn�t think I was the marrying type. When I was in college, my dorm had a senior dinner every year where underclassmen would make predictions about seniors� future lives. The people who wrote mine said that I would marry someone who would live in the apartment across the hall from me. I always thought that was the perfect arrangement. Living together is hard and quiet time is hard to come by. I wish I�d appreciated it more when I was younger.

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