Happy faux-Fall!

I'm not even going to try to make an excuse for not posting in over a month (except that, as I type this, I realize that that's exactly what I'm gearing up for). It's been such a busy month, full of job searching, applications, lots of hot, hot days, a few visits with family and friends, and settling more firmly into our life here, together. I absolutely love being married.

I'm listening to Il Divo's "Regresa A Mi" as I type this, and I love this song; it fits in perfectly with this day, the crispness of a 57 F morning, and my pumpkin spice candles and potpourri.

I'm not usually a potpourri person. Bags of stale, technicoloured, cellophane-wrapped fake-smelling stuff? Ugh. I hate it, and especially when people leave it out for so long that it gets fuzzy from dust. Eeesh. I bought this potpourri from a vendor at the Johnny Appleseed Festival in Fort Wayne, Indiana, this past weekend. This potpourri is beautiful and natural, with tons of apple slices, slivers of orange peel, and pine cones, and smells amazingly of Autumn, with clove and cinnamon - and as anxious as I am for chilly days to finally be here to stay (we're supposed to be back up near 90 in a few days), I just had to get it.

The Johnny Appleseed Festival was so much fun! It's a festival set in the early-to-mid 1800s, thus all the vendors (hundreds and hundreds) have to dress in time-period appropriate clothes, and cannot have any newfangled technology helping them make their wares. We went there with our friends from Tennessee (we have friends!), and had a super time getting to interact with real! live! people! We saw people using thick wooden paddles to stir a huge, cast-iron cauldron of soup (am I the only who was violently reminded of Voldemort's rebirth at the end of Book 4? Oh, probably...), and a man perched on the wooden frame of a pottery wheel, keeping the wheel going with his foot, and creating amazing things with the clay in his hands.

And I got to see a llama. LLAMA!

John is doing well, loving most of his grad classes, and is doing a fantastic job as a grad assistant. He loves helping teach and tutor, and it really confirmed for him the fact that he wants to always be in the University teaching field.

The biggest piece of news around here, though, is that (as of tomorrow, when I sign the contract) I have a job. Finally! I'd been quite discouraged, because of all the applications I'd submitted since we moved here the end of July, I hadn't gotten any call-backs. None. Then, on September 6th, a lady from the University Library called to set up an interview appointment (a month after the deadline to submit the application!). I had the nearly two-hour long interview on the 7th, and though they said they had more interviews the following week, I got a call on the 11th, offering me the position. I was completely shocked.

I start on my birthday. :)

In the meantime, though, I've been cooking every day, rediscovering how much I love it, how proud I feel when John sits back in his chair after the first bite, and says, "Sweetheart, this should be served in a restaurant!" I'm just hoping me means, like, a good restaurant.

Also, be impressed; I've made a whole flock of origami paper cranes. They're resting on one of the endtables in the living room until I figure out what to do with them. I folded them while I was watching one of the bi-weekly two-hour marathons of "Friends," just so that I felt that I was at least semi-productive while I sat on the couch.

Sorry for this boring post, but really, I was feeling terribly guilty for not having even logged in for over a month (what's the website? boggler? blogger? bolgger?).