Several Months Later

Just a quick update for now.

Since my last post, I have:

• Read 10 books, including "Slaughterhouse-Five" by Kurt Vonnegut, which I thought was great. I first became curious about the book around the time Vonnegut died. Until I read some of the stories about him and his most famous novel, I never had a desire to read the book because I thought it was a collection of five short stories, all set in a slaughterhouse. (Not something I'm proud of as an English major, but there it is.)

• Been to New York. Among our stops while we were there: The Jell-O Museum, which was a letdown, but only because my imagination is much bigger than what the Museum is capable of producing. I was kind of hoping to see exhibits made out of Jell-O, instead I saw Jell-O boxes and a TV that shows all of the commercials Bill Cosby starred in.

• Learned the hard way that just because a contractor is nice, doesn't mean he's honest. Our house was damaged in spring storm, and the man who repaired our roof neglected to seal around the chimney. We didn't know he didn't do the job right until the downpour from what was once Hurricane Gustav reached our home, soaking our carpet. The contractor was MIA during the rainstorm, so we got someone else to fix it, and the jerk has yet to reimburse us for that and the cost to clean all of the water out of our carpets.

• Started dyeing my hair. I always said I'd grow old gracefully, but I didn't like that I felt like I looked older than my 38 years. Now that I see my hair colored, I don't know what I was so afraid of.