Quick update.

F and I went to FL Thursday and came home Friday. Total jackass in line at the Dollar rental car counter - they should have told him to take a hike. Those people can never be placated and it's pointless to try. Drove around a lot, got lost repeatedly (which is useful for ultimately finding your way around and knowing where stuff is) but had maps. Looked at 6 houses for rent, picked one. Nice-looking neighborhood, house OK; orange tree, bird-of-paradise tree, palm tree in yard. Applications put in. Met new boss for lunch at Mexican restaurant, had a nice time. Speeding ticket on the way back to the airport.

Now we are packing and planning to make the trek on Friday. Busy as hell. I'll update more when things get settled.

I used to sew.



This is a chiffon bolero I made for F when she was in elementary school. There was a princess-line dress that went with. Maybe when things settle down I'll have time to sew again.

Okay, so Thursday my group had a little cake and ice cream for me, and a $25 gift certificate, which I thought was really nice. I told them I'd buy a nice blouse with it and think of them when I wore it. (And for those who wonder how you can buy a "nice" blouse with $25, in the context of what you would wear to work in a laboratory, you wouldn't spend more than that, and most of the time a lot less.) Some of the plant people partook of the cake and ice cream, of course, and my boss, and the owners. I will say that I've been very disappointed in the way the owners have acted about me leaving. People always have the right to better their circumstances if they can. It's up to the employer who realizes he has a valuable employee, to see to it that she will want to stay. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

But they did tell me that I can still change my mind, and even come back if I don't like Florida.

So I'm unemployed for the next couple of weeks. Weird feeling. I have a LOT to do during this time. Finish getting the house sorted out, find a place to live in Florida - F and I are going there later this week to do that - and work out the logistics of me moving now and R following after he gets F off to college and the house sold.

We took a walk in our pretty historic-district neighborhood after dinner the other day. We've lived here 17 years and have a lot of memories of those walks after dinner, F on her tricycle and then her skates, and so forth. But on one of the gaslight-inspired lamposts we found, for the first time, gang graffiti. If I'd had any lingering doubt about the rightness of moving away, it's gone.

I have a little catching up to do.

Yesterday was R's and my 25th wedding anniversary. Yes, 25th. We have coexisted in close proximity for a quarter of a century without killing one another, and in fact actually still liking each other, which is something.

To celebrate, we and F had dinner at Paulette's. This is a Memphis landmark I will miss, even though I can't afford to go very often. The popovers alone are to die for.

My parents sent flowers.



They're lovely and they smell very nice, hence their being put on the mantel because the cats wanted to eat them.

And F gave us some very nice Godiva chocolate, which she ordered several weeks ago to be delivered for the occasion.

Today we were going to visit family in Mississippi but F elected to get a virus instead (kidding, I'm sorry she was sick) and I actually needed to be doing some stuff here in the house instead anyway. Got through a lot of cleaning, sorting, and readying to be packed. I continue to discover that cabinets and closets I'm going through were actually gone through not too long ago so doing this stuff is not as hair-raising as I had feared.

Friday they are having a final farewell lunch at my previous workplace (although the division I was in won't be leaving till the end of August) and I've been invited. But that's also my last day where I am, my coworkers may want to take me to lunch or something, and it would be churlish of me to go to the previous place for lunch if that's the case.

F and I will probably go to Florida next week to look at some places to live. We found some nice-looking rental property on the net and will line up appointments.

So that's it. I hope everybody had a nice 4th.

I have an informal list of things I won't miss about Memphis. Wendi Thomas is muscling her way onto it with her dang column today, which I won't even link to, in which she bemoans the SC decision to end the assignment of kids to school by race. Even though she admits that in Memphis, where white kids make up 9% of the student population and many schools have fewer than 3 white students or no white students at all, it can't make any difference. Even though she admits that when Bush was elected she predicted that she'd be picking cotton on a plantation by the time he's out of office and now realizes that won't happen - does she realize how extremely offensive that is to those of us who voted for Bush? Does she realize what she's calling us?

From the article: "But there's got to be some mixing for the black student not to buy into the stereotypes he'll hear about white kids, and vice versa. Especially vice versa."

Why "especially", Wendi? Why?

I am SO READY to be out of here.