Holding it together

Pre-moving crazy lady blogging fail. Sorry, guys, but you probably don't want to be along for this ride. You can catch me again in a few weeks, when the cheery grinning photos on the Great Wall start, when I inevitably photograph every dumpling in China and post it here, when things are lively and exciting and fun.

These weeks are not always those things. Oh, of course there is some fun--I had a great time last night with many friends at a happy hour I planned (with a final trip to Ray's Hellburger afterwards), we went to Restaurant Eve in Alexandria for my birthday (amazing special occasion restaurant--the food was tremendous), saw a sweetly amateurish play at the Capital Fringe Festival ("Between Takeoff and Landing"), ate incredible spaghetti and meatballs at Potenza (a favorite Italian restaurant near our apartment), tried Shake Shack for the first time (in DC! Heresy, I know. Also, you may notice there is a little too much burger action going on lately.), and celebrated America's birthday with hot dogs and fireworks.

But somehow, these weeks are much more defined by the constant calculations (how many bottles of contact solution to put in my air shipment? How many boxes of Ziploc bags? How many Ziploc bags should I first remove from said boxes to put my toiletries I'm traveling with in? Why am I thinking so much about Ziploc bags? Who am I? What is the purpose of my life? etc.), the worries, the feeling of being behind in pretty much everything.

Add on top of that my eventual realization that I don't really like being in training. Oh, sure, the Foreign Service Institute has a pretty campus; the cafeteria recently added sushi as a lunch option; the things we learn are mostly useful and occasionally interesting; but somehow a long stint in training makes me grouchy. I am ready to be off and doing something, to actually feel gainfully employed.

(At my college reunion recently, someone I was talking to was complaining about having to go back to work and see her unpleasant boss after the weekend was over. And I said something like, "Yeah, it's weird, I don't really have a boss now." And she gave me this look of sympathy that I assumed meant she thought I was unemployed. So I start rambling about how, actually, I do have a job, really, I just don't really have a boss for this year, I mean, I don't really answer to anyone exactly. And then she just shot me a look of hatred.)

So really, it's better I blog less now. You'll enjoy Great-Wall-climbing, dumpling-eating, Beijing-exploring Katie, I swear. She's great! Ziploc-bag-counting Katie is not really the one you want to hang out with.