My goodness, but it’s been an awfully long time, hasn’t it? Boy, do I suck. But in fairness, lots of things have been keeping me busy. Some of them interesting and noteworthy, some not. Some fun and exciting… most not. So here’s the short-short version.

Grad school class No. 1 is finished with an A! (Thank you Karen!) Which means I’ve got a good start on my future of bigger degrees and greater geekiness. I can’t wait. It also means I get reimbursed by work for the $2,400 I dropped on tuition and books. And for that, I really can’t wait. Really. Neither can American Express. Hurry that check along, HR.

In October I got back to England, which is what I’ve been trying to do for three years, and finally managed. It was exactly right in a hundred ways. You know how whenever you go back to something, it’s smaller, and less fancy, and just missing something somehow? And how disappointing that can be, even when you were trying to prepare yourself for that? Yeah. It was not like that at all. The Abbey will be the Abbey forever, I hope, and I don’t think it could ever be any less Abbey. It’s the one thing I’ve got like that, and I can say I think everyone should find one. But get your own Abbey. This one’s taken.

And Ireland, too, about which I can say – again, this being the short-short version – I want to go back, but not to Dublin. I can get vomit on my shoes right here in the tri-state area. I was a big fan of the sheep and waterfalls and mountains and peat, though.

What else. Oh yes. I returned from the UK and found… job security? What job security? In 2002? Right. Not here. So I went job-hunting, and that’s been keeping me busiest ever since the middle of October. There appears to be a little teeny light appearing at the end of that tunnel, and so as not to jinx myself, I’m not saying any more about it. Stay tuned.

And now? Well, now it’s Christmastime! And, with six days to go, I am just solidly planted right in the middle of all this Christmasness and enjoying it fiercely, despite all the scheduling drama and logistical nightmares it entails.

So, with that… Happy Christmas!